


Looking Through the Mist

by Endlessnotebooks



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Naruto
Genre: Chasing Shadows AU, Families of Choice, Family, Feel free to correct me, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, I am learning Korean so there may be mistakes, Kiri Culture Evolved Differently AU, Kiri has some Korean customs AU, Kiri speaks Korean AU, Korean names, Riko stays in Kiri, Silencia20, Teams as family
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-02-14
Updated: 2018-06-10
Packaged: 2019-03-18 02:03:02
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 15
Words: 49,837
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13671975
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Endlessnotebooks/pseuds/Endlessnotebooks
Summary: Terumi Mei was hesitant to let the girl go. She had seen the effect war had on her, and if there was one thing she could hope for it was to give Nara Riko a chance to heal and strengthen herself after the war before sending her back. To do that, however, she would have to keep her in Kiri longer, and there was no way she could justify that.Not unless the girl had a Genin team and was tied to the village indefinitely, anyway.And while Riko divides her time between missions and her team, the Mizukage may just be able to give the girl an advantage against the threats that are growing all around them.





	1. And So Life Moves On

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Chasing Shadows (ONGOING REWRITE)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/6552127) by [silenceia](https://archiveofourown.org/users/silenceia/pseuds/silenceia). 



Terumi Mei looked at the file in her hands. Two of the only people who knew about the girl were in the room, watching their Mizukage intently.

“How do we send her back? She’s been so close to broken, and from what I can gather she’s barely holding it together. How do we throw that into a peaceful life again?” To be fair to Riko, most Kiri shinobi, particularly Jounin who had seen some of the worse battles, were barely holding it together.

Mei had seen peace. And more than that, she remembered how surreal it had been, seeing peace after so much war. The idea that she didn’t have to look over her shoulder nearly as much, that she could (theoretically) relax. It was an alien concept, to go from war to peace, with nothing in between.

Even more so for someone like Akagi Ren that had killed and destroyed more than she had built and created. A shinobi like Nara Riko, who had come into this from being a peacetime shinobi - an all together different experience from being a wartime shinobi. Nara Riko, who had spent so long undercover as Akagi Ren, Mei couldn’t see anymore where one ended and the other began. There was nothing she could look to that would tell her that Akagi Ren and Nara Riko were really two separate people.

Ao sighed. “She’s a brat. What do we care?”

Zabuza huffed a laugh. “She’s a fucking strong brat, is what she is. That’s why we care.”

Mei rolled her eyes. _Men. Sometimes they got on her last nerve._ “She’s a fucking strong brat we all have an attachment too, and who was one of several of those insane enough to help us win this war. So, do we keep her here or do we send her back?”

“Do both.” Zabuza leaned towards the file. “Keep her here as part of the rebuilding effort, and when we think she’s stable enough, or we’ve rebuilt enough, we send her back.”

Ao raised an eyebrow at him. “And how do we tell Konoha we’re keeping one of theirs longer than we intended?”

“They don’t know the progress she’s made, and if we send her back now, she won’t be able to use a shit-ton of her arsenal because it’s completely tied to Akagi Ren.

“She had just made chuunin when we got her. If we say we have a couple more things we want to train her on, who are they to say no? When we send her back, we put together some believable intel she could have gathered and then we let the tree-huggers do their thing from there.”

Mei looked Zabuza in the eye, piecing together parts of his plan. “What do we want to train her on? She should have something extraordinary if we’re keeping her.”

“How the hell should I know? You’re the Kage, you think of something.”

“How much do you think sending one of the Seven Swords into Konoha would improve relations?”

Ao scoffed. “All due respect, Mizukage-seonsaengnim, but are you fucking nuts?”

Zabuza looked thoughtful. He opened his mouth once before closing it. When he finally decided, he looked towards the window. “We have a lot of genin in the field that would benefit from an instructor, and we have enough stability now to start making teams and running them on rebuild missions. Make her a jounin instructor first, then give her a sword. If we play our cards right, maybe we can keep her indefinitely.”

The three of them settled in, knowing this would be a much longer conversation than they originally planned.

* * *

 

One of the first things Nara Riko – more Ren than not most days, but she could still feel that Konoha spark beneath all the scarring and anger – noticed about the Land of Water was that, outside of those who did business on the mainland, the language most people used wasn’t Japanese.

Ao and Zabuza had shrugged it off, having grown up on the islands and never thought about it. Haku, however explained a theory of his as it having to do with the isolation and how their language developed differently after having a couple hundred years with minimal mainland contact. 

It was Suigetsu, in all his patriotism that explained it to her and then refused to use any other language with her, forcing her to learn it. “You’re a Kiri shinobi, now, you’ll damn well talk like one,” he had said. Nevermind he knew she would one day be going back to Konoha.

According to Suigetsu, who had learned about it from his brother, when Kiri started to become alienated from the other villages and get a reputation for bloodlust, their dialect came to be mocked quite a bit as one more ‘oddity’. With that, some of the civilians just let it slide around and become its own thing. Instead of learning Japanese proper, they claimed their language was different, that it operated by different rules. With time, that not only came to be true, but the language and culture evolved into something separate. The isolation of being a nation of islands a decent distance off the coast of the mainland certainly helped. So, while all the shinobi learned Japanese and conducted the majority of their business in it, it wasn’t uncommon within the Land of Water to hear shinobi merge the two languages, overlapping addresses and formalities within their home.

It was Chuseok – a purely Kirigakure holiday, and the only one where the shinobi were given what could amount to a day off in all the aftermath of the war. For what was maybe the third time since coming here, Ren was in the village-proper, her team being called in to meet with the Mizukage in the middle of the afternoon.

It as also the first time since she left Konoha that she was wearing anything close to nice or ceremonial. The hanbok Haku had found for their team were all nicely colored; dark enough to not stand out, but enough color on it that they didn’t feel like clothing they would wear in the field.

It had taken her several tries to get the gown on, and even then it took Suigetsu scoffing “Dongsaeng…” and coming over to help her. Haku had helped her pin her hair up (she hadn’t needed the help, but Haku had asked her help with his own hair and wanted to return the favor).

Her normal braided bun was more decorative for the event, with hairpieces pinned in, her braids twisted to rest lower on her neck than normal held in place with a senbon needle and decorated with flowery clips. Haku had been slapping her hand away ever since when she went to touch it.

To be fair, it wasn’t often she had her hair done up fancy anymore.

“We will be late if we don’t hurry. You three must stop dawdling.” Haku’s stare was one that promised long training sessions filled with pain if they didn’t hurry up.

“Seonbae,” Ren glanced up from where she was buying a sweet bun, “We won’t be late. Promise.”

Haku wasn’t convinced. He glanced at Suigetsu, stressing his words as he addressed Ren, “You and Chojuro aren’t the ones I’m worried about, Deongsaeng.”

When she had become “Younger Sister” or “Sibling” to them she couldn’t remember, but it was their default way of addressing her if they weren’t in the field. At this point, when they were in the same station, it was relatively rare for the four of them to split up if they could avoid it; the four of them had, like several other Kiri teams, become bound together in a way that peace couldn’t bind a team. They were as much protecting each other as they were the village, and their patriotism wasn’t as much to the nation or village as it was to each other and their way of life.

Ren understood Haku’s loyalty to Zabuza a lot better.

Riko understood her sensei a lot better now.

Ren grabbed Suigetsu’s collar, dragging him with them. “Oppa, you can’t keep holding us up. I don’t want Haku trying to stick me with a needle just because you’re curious.”

Suigetsu scoffed. “He wouldn’t.”

Haku’s glare promised nothing less than pain.

At some point, Ren had stopped hoping for the day she went back to Konoha and just accepted it was imminent. She wanted to go home and see her family, she wanted to leave behind the war and bloodshed and try to be productive.

But she also had precious people here, and she didn’t want to leave them behind. She had left enough people behind for a lifetime.

“We need to get an apartment.” Suigetsu glared at his hanbok. “If we’re gonna start having nice shit we should have a place to keep it. Wanna split rent?”

“Sure,” Chojuro shrugged. “It’s probably a good idea anyway, considering.”

The smile on his face seemed foreboding. It didn’t help he was smiling at Ren. Again. “What the hell, Chojuro? What are you hiding?”

He laughed at her, the other two smirking at her ire. It had been this way for _two weeks_ and at this point she had given up.

She would get the information out of them sooner or later, anyway. They had stopped trying to hide things from each other.

The four of them trailed up the Mizukage Tower, Ren moving her skirts carefully so she wouldn’t trip. She didn’t really want to ruin her only hanbok at this point. Not when she might (one day) wear it again.

The good thing about the hanbok Haku had bought was they were designed for shinobi. From weapons pockets, to being significantly looser, so as to accommodate an under-layer of clothing for battle, the hanbok were also reinforced with a mesh layer for protection.

Ren bowed with her compatriots before the Mizukage.

“Akagi Ren, to your left is your genin team. You will teach them in between the higher level missions I send you on. On occasion, you will take them with you on higher level missions, as dictated by me. Is this understood?”

Ren froze. She had promised Hanabi, Chie, and Aimi to be their sensei. Well, Riko had, anyway.

If she wasn’t getting a Genin team, she probably wouldn’t be going back. At least, not anytime soon. She might not get to be the Jounin instructor to Hanabi, Chie, and Aimi. She might not get to be recognized for her skills in her home village. She might not be there to see how far her teammates had come.

Who knew how long would pass before she saw her family?

But she looked at the three girls, all of them in hanbok, looking to her expectantly. All three had seen the tail end of this war, and knew what they were signing up for. All three of them knew she potentially held their career in their hands. A jounin instructor could up their chances of promotion, it would refine them as a group for the Chuunin Exam, and having her specifically as an instructor would give them a certain amount of credit in a fight, given her reputation.

She wouldn’t get to be her cousin’s instructor, and those three little psychos in Konoha would have to deal with it. She had to deal with the had life gave her, and this was one way she could damn well make the best of it.

“I’ll do it. You three, starting tomorrow we meet by the river on the South side of town. Be there at dawn.”

The three looked to the Mizukage, waiting. Mei nodded at them, and in a flash all three stood up, bowing and exclaiming “Ne, Seonsaengnim!”

“Alright then. You three are dismissed. Ren, you will go with your Genin. Keep an eye on them and join in the festivities with them. Haku and the rest of your team will be staying here.”

The three girls filed out, Ren behind them, while Suigetsu became more engaged in the conversation. “So, whatcha need us for, Seonsaengnim?”

Mei smiled. It was no secret she was pleased at being called as “teacher” by most of her soldiers. She was on the track of changing the reputation of the Bloody Mist, and being called a teacher by her constituents made it seem like her goal was that much closer.

“I have a plan for Ren. You’re going to need to start pushing her in your team training though, and I don’t just mean by our normal standards either. I want her ready to take on the Kiba swords by the end of the year.”

“Seonsaengnim, are you sure?”

The Mizukage didn’t look much like a teacher as she leveled a hard gaze at him. “I’m positive.”

* * *

 

Konoha had been calm without Team 7 around. As loathe as Tsunade was to admit it, it had also been _boring_.

Currently, the only one who had returned was Uzumaki Naruto, who stood in front of her babbling about his training mission, while she paid enough attention to follow while she finished paperwork.

“Hey, are Ri-chan and the bastard back?”

Tsunade looked up from her papers. She had hoped he wouldn’t ask about that. “Not yet, though Riko is due back soon.”

“Really?! I can’t wait to see them again! Hey, Baa-chan, do ya think I’m stronger than them now?”

Tsunade smiled. “I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.”

“Oh, you’re no fun, Baa-chan!”

At least one of the brats was back. Maybe that would liven the place up a bit.


	2. You Shouldn't Have Had to Fight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She didn't know if she would be a good sensei, but she would be damn sure these girls didn't go out into the world without being able to defend themselves and their teammates from any enemies that came after them.

Mei looked at the missive in her hand.

_Nara Riko has gone out of communications pending a long-term mission assigned by Jounin Commander Momochi Zabuza. Her current whereabouts are unknown._

_My deepest apologies, Hokage-san._

_-Mizukage Terumi Mei_

She glanced at Ao. “Are you sure we can’t just say she got a Genin team?”

He nodded. “You don’t accidentally get a Genin team. It requires the trust of the Kage. If we trust her enough to give her Genin, it could raise suspicions in Konoha about if she’s actually loyal or not. This would give us enough cover to come up with something better. Something like she took in three brats and started training them.

“Until then, this keeps her here without starting a war.”

Mei sighed. “I don’t like it. Tsunade might see through it, she might accuse us of killing one of their own. There are too many variables with this approach." She glanced at her other impromptu (and reluctant) adviser. “Zabuza, you’ve been oddly quiet.”

The man glared at the letter. “You know my opinion. She’s more and more a Kiri shinobi everyday. Just tell them we’re keeping her for a Genin team and be done with it. Otherwise, they find out we lied and we get accused of subterfuge or espionage or something and she gets executed for aiding espionage, we get wrapped into another war, and everyone loses. I think this approach is the dumbest thing I’ve seen in a while.”

Ao scoffed. “If we keep her for a Genin team we risk pissing Konoha off, and we could really use an ally right about now! Or did you forget the massive civil war we just fought? The one that has every shinobi village we used to be affiliated with turning their backs?”

“We trained their brat for them, free of charge! For two years!” Zabuza tore the paper out of Mei’s hands, “ _We’ve_ done enough for this alliance. Now it’s their turn. We’re asking to keep one of theirs because we don’t have too many jounin left, much less ones that can handle and protect a Genin team. And even some of those, the teacher would just as soon throw them to the wolves and let them die young instead of train them. At least, with Ren, we know she'll do her damnedest to get those girls ready for life on the front lines. 

“If they have a problem with it, we can hold negotiations or mediated talks, or some shit like that. We can’t take back a deception!”

“We’re ninja! We deceive each other!” Ao’s fist slammed against the wall. “If they think otherwise what kind of shit are they on?”

“Boys! Enough!” Mei stood abruptly, causing Ao and Zabuza to collapse into seats without a word. “Good.

“I agree with Zabuza. Draft a different letter, tell them we assigned her a Genin team, and that they passed her exam, and we can’t relinquish her yet because we don’t have enough Jounin strong enough to protect three runts while we rebuild and deal with the end of this war. I want you to include the basic civilian-access file on her team, as well as her own civilian-access file.” Mei took out paper and a pen, quickly writing out a note for her fellow Kage. “Stick this on her file, and don’t edit any of it.”

Ao sighed, moving to do as she said. “I think you’re making a mistake.”

“If shit hits the fan, you can say 'I told you so'. Until then, you take orders from me, and I just gave you one.”

“You’re getting that fucking ‘I told you so’.”

Zabuza barked a laugh. “Yeah, I’m sure we are, Ao.”

* * *

 

Ren walked to the river, watching her Genin. The three girls were very different people, that much was obvious right from the start. There was the one who seemed to lead them, at least socially. She was on the taller side, hair dark and mud-colored. The other two seemed to be equal to her, the rose-haired and innocent looking one playing with a tag on her kunai while the one with deep green hair read a thin notebook, bringing up questions about battles from throughout the civil war, debating tactics with the other two. 

“Okay, you three. Introduced yourselves.”

“Jeong Ji-Su.” Brunette. Clearly their leader, as she moved to stand in front of them, gesturing for them to stand with her. 

“Kim Jae-Un!” The rose-haired one. She seemed excitable, but the sharp look about her screamed 'SHINOBI' to any who were looking. 

“Mi-Na, seonsaengnim.” Green-hair. Her notebook was sticking out of a pocket now, kept in place between her belt and her pants. She seemed to appraise Ren as much as Ren was appraising the girls in front of her. 

“I’m Akagi Ren, but my Korean name is Choi Chae-Seon. I'll answer to either, unless I give you instructions to use one.”

“You took your partner, Choi Chojuro's surname, didn’t you?”

Riko nodded, noting Mi-Na’s quickness to guessing where she, a foreigner, had gotten her Korean name. “Haku and I didn’t have a Korean name, or not one we remembered at the very least, so our teammates let us borrow theirs.”

Jae-Un perks up. “But if you use a Korean name, and you know our culture and our language, why don't you switch completely? Why still list yourself as Akagi Ren?”

“There's a good chance I still have extended family on the mainland. If I ever get the chance I would like to meet them, and it'll be easier to find them if I keep my name.” Not a lie, at all, but certainly not the entirety of the truth. 

Jae-Un nodded, accepting her answer before changing the subject. “Will we have to take Japanese names?” If her tone was anything to go by, that was going to be an interesting discussion for the future.

“Possibly, when we start doing mainland missions. The former Mizukage wanted to keep Korean as secret from other villages as possible However, with the civil war, it’s entirely possible other nations have already learned about it from some of the civilian refugees. We’ll wait and see.”

Jae-Un seemed perturbed, but Ren wasn’t going to give it much thought. “Well, since you’ve dug around my life, I’m going to ask you to tell me about yourselves.”

Ji-Su straightens, taking the lead, as Ren expected. “My family died in the war, and I was sent to the Slums to be tested to be a shinobi. I became a Genin eight weeks ago. I have fought in two battles, one in the Slums and one after making Genin. I know standard shinobi jutsu, as well as the basics for using senbon needles in combat. My chakra nature is water.” 

She was a Kiri native, according to her file, so her chakra nature was no surprise, but Ren made a note about her no-nonsense attitude. Kiri shinobi were tested for their chakra nature before being assigned Genin or Genin-Chuunin (another popular grouping, due to the shortage of available Jounin teachers) teams, so it was more than likely Mei had given her a balanced out team. She stood ramrod straight, and spoke carefully, like she had been trained. Given what information Ren could get from the file, that was entirely likely, as was the chance Ji-Su had been put through a higher-end civilian education. 

Jae-Un followed suit, though her posture was slumped in slightly, at a natural angle. “My family is alive, but they fled the war zone. We got separated when we were close to the border, and some of the rebels found me and put me in the training camp. I became a Genin three weeks ago. I haven’t fought in any battles, but I’ve been trained in basic medical care, and would like to learn medical jutsu, if possible. My chakra nature is earth.”

An earth chakra type wasn't uncommon in Kiri either, though water was prevalent. Jae-Un, for all her hidden sharpness, was doing her best to conceal her abilities as a shinobi. Ji-Su had the looks for undercover work, being rather plain, but Jae-Un seemed to have the potential for it skill-wise.

“Mi-Na, and I have no family. I don’t know my surname, because I was left at an orphanage just before the war started. I ran away several years ago, stopped using the surname I was assigned, and snuck into a rebel encampment at the start of the war. I was trained in the basics between battles, have fought in three, and was officially listed as a Genin five weeks ago. My chakra nature is wind.”

Ren was right; Mei had given her a balanced out team, in terms of chakra nature. This team, and perhaps it was another of the cultural differences she had encountered during her life here, hadn’t spoken of likes, dislikes, or dreams like her own had. It was personal history – just enough for their teacher to be aware of any relevant background, as well as the teammates. All three were keeping things back, but none of them had withheld the background information one could find in a civilian file.

Just another reason this team was going to be interesting, she guessed. Who knew? Maybe, one day, she could ask them what their dreams were. Right now, though, something told her there wasn't much for them to dream about besides making it through until tomorrow. 

“Well I’m not going to sugar coat things. None of you should have had to fight, but you have, so I’m going to assume you’ve all seen the value of teamwork, right?” The three of them nodded. “Good. So you’re going to try to fight me. The only caveat is you can’t leave the river.” She may have said she wouldn’t test their teamwork, but she was interested to see how they worked through this newest challenge if they didn’t think they had to worry about passing a Jounin’s test. Not that Kiri had ever really done that before, or could afford to do it now. 

Ren was also interested to see if they had some prior association with each other. Shunshining to the shore, Ren watched the reactions of her students.

“What?” Jae-Un rocket up. “But how are we supposed to fight soaking wet?”

“Don’t get wet.”

Jae-Un opened her mouth to start shouting again. It was nice to know they still had some childish innocence in them. Ji-Su poked Jae-Un’s shoulder and whispered about water-walking in her ear.

“Oh! You got it, Seonsaengnim! We’ll win this fight!” So much bravado in such a tiny body. It reminded her of home. 

Ren was excited to see how this turned out.

* * *

 

Her students were skilled, there was no doubt. They may be Genin, but in a peaceful nation Ji-Su and Mi-Na would probably be on the cusp of becoming a Chuunin. Jae-Un was the newest to shinobi life, and arguably the weaker for it, but, even for her, the second skin of a shinobi fit like a glove. She had gone from looking like a fun-loving, doe-eyed child to looking every bit the ruthless fighter Ren knew she would be training her to become.  

The three of them were soaking wet, as controlling one’s chakra to water-walk while fighting took some time to get used to, but they definitely had a sense of each other’s skills.

Ren was currently hiding in a tree from the three of them. Mi-Na had a very tactical mind, and Ren was planning on nurturing that to the fullest extent she could, hence the change from full-front battle to hiding in the shadows and letting the girl learn to find her teacher and plan a strike.

Jae-Un had the potential to be a decent sensor, if she could focus for more than a few seconds at a time outside the immediacy of battle. She was young, though, and she hadn’t had a chance to be taught the other side of a shinobi lifestyle – being able to stay still and quiet for a long enough period of time you can fool your enemy into a sense of security. She was a quick-thinker, though, and she didn't stay still too long, and she refused to stay down if she got taken down.

Ji-Su, however, was watching the battlefield closely. She had done her research, and had seen that Ren had developed a reputation for stealth and cunning on the battlefield.

Ji-Su tapped Mi-Na’s shoulder, gesturing to the trees. Mi-Na nodded, making a few hand signs. The girl fell in the river. Again. The three of them were soaked, breaking concentration as they tried to fight while also staying on top of the river, but she accounted for that as she did the signs and adjusted as she needed so the attack hit a cluster of trees. It was a decently powered wind jutsu that knocked a few branches around enough that their teacher moved before coming in and advancing at the three. Ren was pulling her punches, and she was fairly certain at least one of her Genin had caught on, but she refused to go at them as though she was going to kill them. 

Kakashi-sensei hadn't done that with her team, and regardless of a war zone, this was just to get a feel for their abilities. Harder fighting could come later.

Mi-Na threw ninja wire to Jae-Un, who launched herself into the air and over their teacher, unspooling it and throwing it to Ji-Su, who channeled enough chakra into it to make it painful for her and her teammates to hold, but also for Ren to move too far, as she was standing between the two lines. The three girls looked at each other, ready to cheer when suddenly their teacher dropped into the river, appearing behind Jae-Un and holding a kunai to her neck.

“Let this be your first lesson. You always, _always_ , finish off your opponent. If you hesitate to do that for even a second, you’ll lose a comrade, and that is unacceptable.

“People who break the rules are scum, but those who leave behind their teammates are worse than scum. The only thing below them are the people who could have stopped a comrade’s death and didn’t.

“You’re not going to save everyone, but if I hear one of you had the opportunity to do something to save a comrade and didn’t, the next time we meet is going to be painful.

“You three did well. I expect you three to wash up, and then we’ll meet in an hour and get our assignment for tomorrow. Understood?”

The three of them nodded, racing off. The first day with their sensei had definitely been interesting.

“Why’d she make us do all that on the water? Now my clothes are soaking wet!”

“They’ll dry out, Jae-Un. I’d be more worried about that rat’s nest in your hair.” Mi-Na laughed as she pulled a finger through Jae-Un’s hair. The other girl cried out as Mi-Na yanked into a mass of tangles, before launching an ‘attack’ on her teammate.

All three of them had hair that had been tangled almost beyond repair from the variety of wind and water jutsu, as well as from the currents of the river whenever they fell in. Ji-Su pulled at one of the tangled strands. Even if she had the time, this would be a bitch to get out. And it definitely would take more than an hour if she didn’t want to damage it.

“Hey guys,” Ji-Su glanced at her teammates before palming a kunai and pulling the strand up. “How do you think I’d look with short hair?”

* * *

 

Ren loved her team already.

Maybe love was a strong word, since she had just met them. But even so, she knew those three would become something incredible if she trained them right.

Their chakra control wasn’t the best it could be, but time and more training would help that. Once they could perform jutsu and balance on the river, she planned on teaching them the Water Whip. The three had been better than she had hoped, however, and were able to water walk.

The three of them had come in at the end of the war, which had spared them some of the horrors, but the Slums weren’t to be underestimated. Those girls had undoubtedly seen things they never wanted to see. They had likely been on the receiving end of a litany of dangers, given the ruthlessness of the Slums.

Slipping into the room she had rented with the rest of her team, she changed into something better for the more battle-oriented for the assumed-to-be ruthless training she’d be doing with her team later that evening. No one else was present, and as such, there was very little she could do but think about the team.

Mi-Na looked like one of the women she had fought with before. She had been slaughtered in battle, but she had been kind.

Her family had been hunted down to a few members for their bloodline, though Ren never really learned what it was. Too many of the bloodline clans had gone extinct for anyone with a bloodline to be exceedingly public about it. Ren had heard about it after the woman got drunk with her once, and she had to slip a privacy seal up just in case.

It had been the anniversary of the death of most of her clan. The others were likely scattered around the Elemental Nations, refugees from a war most of the clan hadn't had interest in, as only a few of them in any generation ever became shinobi in the first place. 

That was the last interaction the two of them had.

Mi-Na was a budding tactician, though. That was certain. The girl was perceptive in ways Shikamaru was at that age, though she lacked the hesitancy Ren and her Academy compatriots (her brother included) had. She commanded the other girls in battle effectively. While Ji-Su may be the leader of the team in a diplomatic sense, it was clear which of these girls was going to lead them in battle.

Her file gave little information aside from what she herself had given in regards to her living situation prior to joining. There was a fire recorded at that orphanage, with casualties. It had occurred a few days after Mi-Na ran away, raising the question if the girl was connected in any way. Seeing as there was no concrete way of knowing, Ren was going to make a point of watching the girl’s behavior and interactions. If she had a budding psychopath on her hands, she wanted to be prepared. As far as she had seen, though, the girl was just a quick-thinker and fairly aware regarding the positions of her teammates in a fight and their skills.

Jae-Un had been a small powerhouse in the making. According to her records she had been trained in some first aide, and someone had given her the basics of training in medical jutsu, but the girl had also picked up some basic wind jutsu along the way and was skilled (if only moderately, at the moment) in a variety of weapons. If she could refine her control enough she could balance on the water and do jutsu, the girl would not only become an excellent fighter, it would also mean her potential as a medi-nin would be much more potent.

Ji-Su was once an heiress according to the file Ren had received. The girl had made the jump to shinobi, as she said, after the presumed death of her family. She had been fought over by cousins and extended family in other countries, but had avowed herself to some other cause. Whether it was vengeance or merely an ability to protect others, Ren had yet to see, and if she wasn’t careful the girl could quickly deteriorate as she got higher in the ranks, throwing herself into a deadly revenge fantasy that would destroy her and those close to her.

Or Ren was projecting her team and past too much onto these girls, and Ji-Su was just becoming a shinobi because she had seen the horrors of war and wanted to be able to protect herself. 

Ji-Su certainly had diplomatic skill. It was likely learned from her father, who had been a merchant for several years. Her grasp of the mixing of Japanese and Korean also sounded like the mainland markets closest to Kirigakure, where the languages mixed a lot more, and differently, as shinobi tended to mix terms from the two, while the merchants often merged grammars together, as well as merging some of the words.

It would make her useful for information gathering in that region, and perhaps in other missions. If she could communicate well with merchants and market workers it would improve their information gathering. Moreover, if Ji-Su was as adaptable as she seemed – and a fairly average appearance was an advantage in that department, certainly – then she could follow Ren’s specialty. Infiltration and Assassination wasn’t pretty, and she wouldn’t encourage the girl into it, but it made sense, given the advantage she had with a plain face and her slight and long build that she would be good at it. There was always a chance she would be pushed into it regardless of whether or not she wanted to be.

Ren was… she was certainly excited to work with this team, to teach and build these girls up instead of taking life. But she was apprehensive. She didn’t want her students to become as messed up and destructive as she had become.

Ren looked down at her hands. It had been so long since she was a teacher, and now she had three students who seemed as dedicated as could be.

The door opened, and she felt someone’s hand smack against her temple. Grabbing Suigetsu’s wrist, she pulled him down and knelt on his back, one leg up and ready to move if he decided to continue this mini-fight.

He laughed and tried to buck her off, knowing full well she had probably stuck her knee to his clothing with chakra. “Alright, Doengsaeng, let’s go. We’ve got team training in like, what, five minutes?”

“Is it that late?” She didn’t help him up. It had been drilled into her after coming here (not that Konoha hadn’t insisted on similar, it was just more emphasized when one could die at any moment, and bad habits could make the difference in how long you lived) that you shouldn’t help your sparring partner up. After all, if you got in the habit, you might help an enemy up, and that could spell your own death.

“Yeah, dumbass. What, you spend the whole afternoon wailing to yourself about past mistakes?”

“When the hell have I ever done that?” They both knew when, but they weren’t going to bring it up. “No, you son of a bitch, I was reading my Genin’s files.”

“Oh, nice. Anything interesting?”

Ren shrugged. She wasn’t giving that information out free. If any of her teammates wanted it she was going to make them work for it, damn it.

“Come on, Doengsaeng! Tell me!”

“No.” Ren moved the files into a seal on her belt, knowing they would get distracted. “I’m not going to be late to team training, again.”

“You already are, idiot.”

“Well then I’m not going to go so low as to be later than _you_.”

Jumping through the window, she laughed at Suigetsu’s outraged cry. That was undoubtedly going to come out in their training, and it would be hilarious to see. She made a path to their current meeting-grounds.

The Kiri training grounds weren’t official, marked-off segments of land like they were in Konoha. Instead, teams found areas that they felt were secluded enough to make for a decent training ground and worked there. Most Jounin teams circulated which grounds they worked on with decent regularity, aiming to protect team tactics and individual abilities. Mei had decided to keep Jounin groups that worked well as official teams, both due to the shortage of shinobi available and the strong bonds many of the Jounin groups – Ren’s team included – had formed during the civil war that bordered on commanding more loyalty than village loyalty for a number of higher-ranked shinobi.

Ren met with her team on the outskirts of the village, by a small ravine. It wasn’t too far from where she had met her Genin, but had the added benefit of rapids, which made their team training significantly more fun. Four water users playing with rapids meant their techniques either splashed to the ground or became wild and hard to control if they weren't careful, leading to great fights between them.

The second Ren’s foot set down into the training ground her sword was in her hand and meeting Haku’s larger blade, pushing against it and allowing her to slip down and shunshin across the field to be behind him, throwing a senbon needle towards him. Chojuro swept up behind her, and Suigetsu closed in, seeming ready to chop him in half.

“What is this? Gang Up On Ren Day?”

Suigetsu huffed a laugh. “Something like that.”

Haku swept towards her feet, making Ren jump to avoid it. Not one to miss an opportunity, Ren sent a kick flying into Chojuro’s face, and things finally slid into place.

Whenever she sparred with her team, she entered an in-between space where she was both Riko and Ren, and it was a comfortable reminder of who she was, on both sides of the Land of Water border.

Chojuro leaned back, but not enough to keep his glasses. Ren’s foot connected and knocked the frames to the ground, sending Chojuro down to find them before jumping back in the fight.

“You should really hold those on with chakra or seals or something.”

“You broke my last pair with seals on them, Suigetsu.”

“Yeah, Suigetsu.” Ren smirked as she ducked a blade and sent hers flying towards Suigetsu’s stomach. “Shut the fuck up.”

“You little bitch!” It was nice, having a teammate that could put themselves back together.

The three of them kept up the elaborate dance they had going, but before long Ren found herself being backed into a corner.

Shingi to Giri found its way back into its sheath as she began the handsigns for a Water Whip, dodging attacks before launching her own.

Her opponents, her teammates, kept going regardless. Haku used the Water Whip on them enough that it didn’t phase them to see it in battle. Instead, Suigetsu and Haku backed away while Chojuro used his own chakra to grab the whip, yanking Ren off balance and towards them. Turning slightly to accommodate the slight spin on her fall, she let herself fall into a forward roll, landing on her side, her hand up over her face and launching a kick into the back of someone’s knee. While they fell, she twisted enough she was on her back. Ren tried getting up, only to find the end of Haku’s sword at her throat.

“Good job.”

Ren scowled at Haku, knowing full well she could have done better. Kiri had taught her that your performance in fight isn’t perfect unless you come out alive. That’s all that matters in the end. In this one, she had come out below the three of them, nevermind they were using ridiculously powered swords and knew her fighting style from so many spars, it still frustrated her to have been overwhelmed so quickly. 

“Come on, Deongsaeng,” Chojuro lent her his hand, “We have some cool stuff to do today.”

* * *

 

Tsunade can’t believe the words on the page in front of her. She has to explain this shit to Riko’s teammates, to her family, and to any of her friends that may start asking questions, and didn’t that absolute _brat_ realize that?

Of course, a Genin team wasn’t something someone could just ask for. It had to be earned, at least in most villages. It was assumed the jounin would be willing (to varying degrees of course) to take on Genin and teach them the ways of the village and the shinobi lifestyle in a more practical and hands-on style.

For a region just coming out of war, it said something the Mizukage was willing to entrust three impressionable minds to a known foreign nin with outside allegiances. And what the full message of that was, Tsunade wasn’t sure. She also wasn't sure how she felt about Riko's actiosn in Kiri, or the fact the girl was not only already a Jounin, but an accomplished one at that. 

Tsunade had been provided three files, names inscribed across the top she had never seen before.

_Jeong Ji-Su. Kim Jae-Un. Mi-Na._

The names were written in Katakana, with a second set of writing in a strange set of letters Tsunade couldn’t recall having seen in her life, except for maybe in some of the coastal markets, and even then, it hadn’t occurred to her it was more than just some sort of market abbreviation style.

The files were minimal. There was also a stack of mission reports, a note on them apologizing for the brevity and the missing sets. Some, the Mizukage insisted in the note, were forced to remain classified, even between villages she hoped were allies.

Tsunade sighed at the stack of reading material. Just more for her to wade through.

“Shizune! I need you to halt all other paperwork for…” she looked at the stack. It wasn’t much. Not really, when one considered a chunk of it was encapsulating two years of one of her shinobi’s life, and even then that some of it had been left out. “Stop it for two hours. And tell Nara Shikaku I want to see him here in one.”

“Yes, Shishou!” Shizune ducked into the office, taking some of the paperwork off Tsunade’s desk and using the opportunity to sneak a peek at whatever it was that had her teacher looking so dour. Carefully keeping her surprise hidden, Shizune left the office, aware that whatever discussion was coming between the Hokage and her Jounin commander, it wasn’t going to be pretty.

* * *

 

Nara Shikaku hadn’t seen his daughter in two years. He didn’t know if she was alive, though he hoped she was. He didn’t even know if she would be the same when she came back. Two years away, in a war zone…

He didn’t want that for her, but he recognized the necessity.

So when he came home, heart heavy after a long argument with the Hokage and bearing the information she had received about Riko, he avoided his wife and son. He couldn’t shift any of this onto them, any of this worry mixed with pride, anger mixed with a heart-stopping and gut-wrenching agony that his daughter wasn’t just not coming back on time, but she had become someone entirely unrecognizable, that there was every chance she wouldn't come back for _years_ longer.

Her reports had basic information about the mission, but as the war went on and she fought more and more battles she never should have seen – that he never should have put her in, no matter how indirectly – he had to wonder if he made the right choice.

His gaze caught the tree outside his office, and while he pondered what he had done to his own daughter, he felt the files slip from under his hand. Yoshino stood in front of him, skimming them before looking at him. “You did what you thought was right.”

“I sent her into a war-zone. Some of these reports weren’t even written by her because she was unconscious or nearly dying at the time.” He pulled one out from the stack. “This was written by her partner, some guy named Chojuro. He says she was hallucinating from fever and infection in a cave, and he had to wait days to even be able to move her!

“And this one!” Another paper coming out of the stack. “Hoozuki Suigetsu wrote it. He detailed exactly what she suffered while being held in captivity, as far as he could see.

“I thought it was the right thing to do at the time, but Kami. How can I think that now, looking at this?

“She’s in Bingo Books, Yoshino. She’s a killer!”

Yoshino took the papers from him. “So is every other shinobi you know.” She gestured for him to follow her, laying out the third-party reports chronologically on the table. “Look at this. I want you to look at the language.

“See this?” She pointed to a set of lines from one of the reports about sixteen months into her Kiri career. It was written by a another shinobi Shikaku had seen in Bingo Books, Ao. “It’s acknowledging her skills. It isn’t respect, but it is a nod in that direction.

“And this one.” Another set of lines, this one in a careful hand by someone named Haku that Shikaku remembered Riko mentioning before, after she and her team bailed out Shikamaru and his team on their mission to Wave. “This is respect. This is eighteen months – a year and a half – after she left. She had the respect of her comrades in under two years, Shikaku.

“I don’t think the girl that will one day come back to us is going to be the same. We may have to call her something else, even, because the name ‘Riko’ may feel to foreign to her. But what I can tell you here and now is that our daughter is an accomplished shinobi. She’s learned and she’s fought, and she’s been safer in Kiri than she would have been here, even with the war.

“We can’t fix it now, but we can certainly keep our eyes and ears open now that we have a name, and we can make sure we’re ready for her when she comes home, no matter what state she's in.”

They did have a name, and that was the worst part. Some of the battles his daughter was most well-known for weren’t even included in the packet.

_Akagi Ren_.

The Bloody Flower of the Mist was his daughter, and he didn’t know whether to be proud or sick.

He didn’t know whether or not to tell Shikamaru, either. As he went to pick up the papers, his wife batted his hand away, taking the remaining files and setting them on the table. She dragged him to their room with a quiet order to sleep.

It looked like she made his choice for him.


	3. Not So Missed Connections

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ren knew she would be seeing some of her old comrades again as they tried to help the Kazekage.   
> She didn't expect how much it would hurt to leave them behind again.

Terumi Mei wasn’t one to gloat. Not often, anyway.

But when a missive returned from the Hokage with nothing but a request for all future mission reports from Nara Riko and a request that Riko be made to “kindly hasten the progress of her Genin team, as she was wanted back in Konoha at the earliest convenience.”

It was a bit of a political “Fuck you”, but it was better than Ao had been convinced of, and that was enough reason for her to make him read through the message.

“It still isn’t good. She’s dealing with it, but she’s not happy about it.”

“But she isn’t on the warpath, which is more than you had hoped for.”

“Well pardon me for being the voice of skepticism and reason.”

Mei barked a laugh at that, looking at her Jounin commander. “Yeah. You’re the voice of skepticism alright.”

Ao rolled his eyes. It was the calm before the storm, and they both knew it.

* * *

 

Over the last few weeks she had been working with her Genin, Suigetsu had started to make her work with Lightning nature chakra, and he was being vague on his reasoning. If it weren’t so damn painful, she probably wouldn’t care as much, but the throbbing pain down her arms was becoming a distraction, and it had left marks.

They weren’t like the ones from when Sasuke hit her with a chidori. No, those marks were clearly from being hit with lighting chakra. Instead, there was an eerie quality to these marks, which looked like scars already, that made it clear they were caused _inside_ of her body.

“I swear, if you are drilling me on lighting chakra _again_ , tomorrow, I will gut you like a fish.”

Suigetsu hissed in laughter, throwing her a rag. “Well, that was the plan.”

“Why?”

The scars were only on her hands now, maybe a few on her wrists, but they were creeping up a little more each time she tried to channel the lighting chakra through her body. It wasn’t easy learning a third element by any stretch of the imagination, but add in a personal distaste for it and the fact it wasn't one of her affinities?

Ren wanted to strangle whoever thought this was a good idea.

The other concern was the seal on the underside of her biceps. While they were technically parts of one seal, which connected to one on the small of her back and kept the disguise up, these two were critical, as they got constant chakra influxes whenever she did jutsu, which kept the seal from collapsing. If the scarring from learning lighting chakra climbed too high, Ren had to wonder what was going to become of those seals.

“Stop worrying about it. You’ve got cooler scars, anyway.” Suigetsu swatted the top of her head, slipping to grab her sleeve and pull her along. “Let’s grab some more boxes.”

They had found an apartment in the middle of the city that catered to Shinobi teams. They were small, but had enough rooms for teams to either share and room a second team or each have separate spaces. The rent was on the higher side, though rent in Kirigakure didn’t tend to be very high to begin with. Their rent was only slightly higher than she had been told Naruto’s was before he left, and with four jounin it wouldn’t be a stretch to cover it.

The civil war had helped with lowering the rent, too. Too few shinobi in-city to actually take an apartment meant it was easier to negotiate rent in the region. Any money was money, after all.

There wasn’t much to move between the four of them. A lot of weapons, and Haku had bought the group cooking utensils as a housewarming to his teammates. Clothing fit into scrolls, for the most part. The boxes were largely scrolls and books, or important files they didn’t want to put in a scroll.

A small bird flew down, perching on what had been a wire-pole, eyeing her from where it sat.

Ren tapped Suigetsu’s calf with her foot as they walked, a Hunter-Nin sign used when undercover. His eyes flicked over for half a second in acknowledgment.

“Take my box. I gotta go.”

No room for a question, no room for debate. He had seen the bird. There would probably be one for him, Haku, or Chojuro within the hour. He took off towards their apartment, just in case.

The bird flew off, and she followed. The messenger birds in Kirigakure were trained to fly to where the orders were to be issued from, instead of carrying a coded mission statement like in Konoha.

It landed on the Hunter-Nin headquarters.

* * *

 

She wasn’t looking forward to this mission, but she would take it. It was her duty to the village.

By the time she left, her face was hidden behind her mask, her normal gear traded in for the depersonalized gear of the Hunter-Nin squad, and she had three other nin at her back. 

Only one of them wouldn't blow a gasket if things went south, as they tended to do when she was involved. 

* * *

 

It was the first time their team had been given an interim teacher, and Chojuro was nervous. He had never been a teacher before, and from what he saw these girls were used to working with someone who seemed to be a natural.

“Ah,” he smiled at them, painfully aware of the sword on his back and the reputation that came with it. “I’m Choi Dae-Suk, though I’m also known as Chojuro. I’ll be training you until Chae-Seon gets back.” He preferred to use Ren’s Korean name. She was practically family at this point, and since she had taken her Korean name, it seemed to put her at ease to hear it used. It separated her from the soldier she had become and made her more the girl he had been partnered with.

The girls introduced themselves, the green haired one watching him carefully.

“Why does Ren-Seonsaengnim have scars growing on her arms?” Ren had said this one was shrewd, that she would catch details. She was the one Ren wanted to work her into a strategist, instead of as a front-line fighter. That was the girl with the purplish-red hair that slumped against a tree, playing with her senbon needles as she watched him, waiting for his answer.

“It’s a new training she’s started. Don’t worry about her – if it gets too dangerous we’ll stop her.”

The short-haired brunette, Ji-Su, scoffed. “Your team’s definition of ‘too dangerous’ and the general definition of ‘too dangerous’ don’t seem to be too close. Are you sure you will stop her before it causes some kind of damage?”

Chojuro sighed. “I’ll try.” He wasn’t going to make any promises he couldn’t guarantee he could keep.

That seemed to be enough to placate the girls, though, and they quickly stood, ready for instruction.

“So what does Ren have you working on right now?”

Ji-Su answered. “She’s had us improving our chakra control by having us fight while water-walking. She’s also been training us on our weapons of choice. She has promised to teach us the Water Whip and/or water clones once our reserves improved and she deemed our control adequate.”

Chojuro nodded. “What weapons do you all prefer?”

Ji-Su shrugged. “I tend to favor knives or fists.”

Jae-Un smiled, “Senbon, for me!”

Mi-Na’s notebook was put away, and she looked towards him. “I’ve been considering learning the sword, but for now I’ve been focusing on my accuracy with shuriken and kunai.”

Chojuro nodded. “Let me see if I can get Haku for you, Jae-Un. Ji-Su, Mi-Na, I might be able to help the two of you.”

Maybe he could handle this whole teaching business after all. It was only for a few days, after all. That's what he had been told when the Mizukage called him in and asked him to take over Ren's team while she was away on a mission, anyway. 

“For now, let’s do physical training.”

* * *

 

Kakashi and Sasuke were being rerouted from their original plan, being sent to aide Sunagakure as they fought to save their Kage.

“We’ve been ordered back to Konoha after this,” Kakashi watched his student carefully. The young man had grown quite a bit over the course of their training. He was far less prone to bouts of impulse (not that they didn’t still happen, of course, but Kakashi had learned before even leaving the village to take what he could get when it came to mitigating some of his students’ habits) and his constant anger and guard had lessened somewhat over the years on the road.

“Will our team be reformed?”

Kakashi shrugged. “That’s not for me to decide, now, is it?”

Sasuke rolled his eyes, continuing on their new track towards Suna. They had allies to support, and they couldn’t waste anymore time.

* * *

 

Ren signaled her group to stop. They had taken a full 34 hours to cross the distance into the Land of Wind, mostly by water and then by land, and now she could sense their opponents ahead. Now was the time to work out a strategy, even if they were a ways away from Suna, where the mission statement had said the main threat was.

She was terrified. Mei had told her she was aiding Konoha. The chances of her being found out were high, and as a result she wasn’t to give away more details than necessary about her stay in Kiri. She wasn’t allowed to go back with them either, though that went without being said.

She had her Genin, after all.

“Our allies are pursuing two jounin-level threats, and based on mission parameters, they’re likely Akatsuki.”

Suigetsu (Jong-Min, since Hunter-nin relied on Korean address forms for their missions, the added layer of anonymity being a protection) stood behind her, her second-in-command by default. The other two, Kim Jeong-Hwa and Park Soo-Jung, were shinobi she hadn’t worked with before, but they were a strong team from what she had heard.

“Jeong-Hwa and Soo-Jung will pursue the threat to the East, work with the Konoha-nin, ne?”

“Ne, Seonbae.” She wasn’t older than either of them, but she was in charge in this mission. That’s what mattered.

“Jong-Min, you’re with me.”

The squad split into pairs, and Ren stopped Suigetsu and herself just before the battle. She could sense Gai-sensei and Genma, as well as Gai’s team.

They were just meters from Hoshigaki Kisame. Technically, he was their target.

Unofficially, they had been informed, they were to aide Konoha and Suna in whatever way they could.

“Split and go around. Come in at him from the North, I’ll distract him for now.” Suigetsu hesitated, palming a seal on his coat. “That was an order, Jong-Min.”

He nodded, taking off. Ren, Riko, Chae-Seon…

Whoever she was in this moment, she was ready to fight for her village. Villages.

Running through hand signs, she prepared a water whip, shunshining in to the left of where Kisame was charging in at Neji.

* * *

 

Gai didn’t know what to make of the masked Kirigakure shinobi that appeared by Hoshigaki Kisame and started attacking. She didn’t speak, and instead engaged in what appeared to be a complicated dance to avoid while striking blows with senbon or her whip, trying to create openings for Gai, even though they had never met.

Something seemed oddly familiar about the way she fought, but every time he saw it, it disappeared.

Gai came in, hoping to shield his already run-down team from any further damage. For all his yelling about the power of youth, he knew when he or his comrades were worse for wear. Shiranui might hide it better, but  Gai knew he was suffering from the deep gash he had sustained along his arm and part of his side earlier in the fight.

“God damn it, you cunt! Who the hell taught you?” Kisame had been cursing and throwing attacks around non-stop since she had shown up on the field. 

The woman didn’t respond, instead ducking around another attack. The way she moved triggered something in Kisame, though, and the shark-man laughed as he dodged a kick from Gai. “You’re that bitch Zabuza started teaching, aren’t you? What’s it they’re callin’ ya? The Bloody Flower?

“Alright, Akagi-chan. Let’s play.”

* * *

 

Ren ducked the blade, feeling it skim part of her hair that moved slightly slower than she did.

_Now would be a great chance to jump in, Jong-Min…_

In his usual style, Suigetsu jumped into the fight with a quick and loud strike from Shibuki, throwing Kisame off balance enough that Ren has a chance to slip in, her own sword in her hand, and aim a strike to his chest.

He deflected, but the wound on his arm would be enough to slow him down, if only slightly.

“Took you long enough, Jong-Min.”

“Eh, Deongsaeng, what did you think I was doing? Sniffin’ flowers?”

Gai faltered a bit as they speak. Korean was the natural for Hunter-nin, especially on the mainland, but this mission was as much about inter-village cooperation as it was about anonymity.

“ _Ilbeon-o marseyo. We have company_.”

Suigetsu nodded, jumping in front of her, switching languages without a thought. “You take a second, get them filled in. I’ve got it for now.”

Ren nodded, falling back towards where Gai stood.

“Hello, sir.” Pretending she didn’t know all of them, when Neji gave her a glare that clearly said he knew something was up. “My comrade and I were sent as back-up aide.”

“Nice to meet you, Hunter-san! I am Might Gai! The Beautif-“

“Beautiful Green Beast of Konoha? I have heard of you, Gai-san. It is a pleasure to meet you.” Introductions were being made to a soundtrack of explosions and multi-lingual cursing. That sounded about right, when she thought about it. An accurate picture of her everyday life, all things considered, just slightly more deadly.

“AH! Truly? You have heard of me?” Not the right thing to say, then.

It was Genma that tried for a name. “That missing nin, he called you –“ But his statement got cut as another explosion rocked the ground under them.

“Deongsaeng, catch!”

Suigetsu was flying towards her, thrown by an attack of the Samehada. Quickly creating a water wall, Ren flew into action.

“Don’t kill yourself, you idiot!”

“Didn’t plan on it!”

The Konoha nin jumped into action, though Ren was quick to land behind Genma and to glance at Gai’s team. “Please, get yourselves out of the line of fire. I will be along soon to provide medical assistance.”

“Hunter-san, I am afraid I can not take that order!” Lee was standing straight, despite his injuries.

“Konoha-san…” She was technically supposed to defer to them, as her team was a reinforcement force, but these were people she considered friends. She didn’t want them in the line of fire.

She had to stop thinking like Riko, though, and think like Akagi Ren. They weren’t friends, they were teammates on the battlefield. She couldn’t take this moment and wasted it. “Fine. Konoha-san, as reinforcements, we defer to you.”

Neji stepped forward. “Hunter-san, we appreciate your help, however all of our skills would best be applied to the fight at hand.”

“Ne, Sunbae.”

“Is the little bitch done yet?” Kisame was sneering at Suigetsu, though he was addressing her.

She hadn’t meant to throw out the Korean terms, or to address them as her superior, but old habits died hard, and being in this uniform brought out a lot of older habits she didn’t feel like correcting. Instead, she responded to the taunt and jumped into action alongside Suigetsu. “Jong-Min, Nuibari!”

The name of the sword was enough to get Suigetsu to catch onto her plan. As he dodged the next strike, he backed out, giving Ren a chance to throw out senbon with wires attached, creating a small web around their opponent. She had developed this based on some of Haku’s attacks with the Nuibari, though it wasn’t nearly as deadly.

Channeling a small amount of chakra into the wires, snagging against Kisame, who redirected his attention, she got an idea.

She hated using lightning chakra, but she had to admit that if this went well, she would owe Suigetsu a drink.

The lightning ducked down the wires in small amounts as she dodged a strike, keeping her hold on the wires. They cut into one side of Kisame while she upped the amount, causing the man to twitch in response. “You bitch!”

“Damn, Deongsaeng!” Suigetsu came down from above, preparing an attack while Genma threw some of his needles at the man. “Should give a guy a little warning before you bite like that!”

“You wish, asshole.”

Genma laughed as he got an opening for a more direct attack as the wires were cut and slashed by the Samehada. “Should you really be fighting with each other right now?”

“Better here than when Haku’s around.” Suigetsu huffed, coming in with the Shibuki towards Kisame’s head.

“Who the hell is Haku?” Genma ducked another strike, getting grazed lightly down his arm, as Ren laughed.

“Our teammate,” she glanced at Suigetsu, knowing she was going to regret her next words. “Though he might be Jong-Min’s boyfriend. Not really sure on that one.”

“You little bitch! We aren’t dating!”

Before he could go too far in his tirade, Ren had shunshined away, getting behind Kisame while he was ever so slightly distracted by Gai charging from the side, landing a strike to his back with a kunai.

Better than nothing.

Kisame twisted around, glaring at her. Suddenly he stopped, glancing less than a second towards a rockface that blocked off some of their vision. “Well it looks like I’ve gotta go. You might wanna go check on those friends of yours, Akagi-chan.”

“Jeong-Hwa, Soo-Jung…” Ren froze. “You son of a bitch!”

“You shouldn’t have split up…” the snicker that followed him as he turned and left was irksome enough, but the way he started to disappear as Ren gave chase sent her into another fit of anger.

“Chae-Seon! Calm the fuck down!” Suigetsu had shown up in front of her and blocked her from going further. “I’ll stick with the Konoha-nin, you go after Soo-Jung and Jeong-Hwa. Understood?”

“I swear to Kami, Jong-Min _if you don’t get out of my way right now!”_

_“I don’t give a fuck who you swear to, you’re not in your right mind. It’s always been the second you start switching languages and charging in without a plan I take over. Now do as your fucking told, understood?”_

Ren scowled at him before taking off. “Son of a bitch.”

“Maa, Riko-chan, that’s a nice disguise.”

As if this could get worse.

* * *

Soo-Jung had avoided looking the Uchiha in the eyes since Jeong-Hwa had gone still. _“He’s just in a genjutsu, he’ll be fine.”_ That’s what this prick had said.

She could really use some help right about now.

Throwing a barrage of kunai at the man, she shunshined fast enough to send some senbon at him.

But that fucking Sharingan told him half a step ahead of time. Fucking Uchiha. If she ever saw another Uchiha, she would gut them and leave them to die because at this point, they were nothing more than a thorn in her side. A toxic, festering, obnoxious thorn.

She felt the chakra before she even realized who had come to help her, and she was silently praying thanks to every god she had ever heard of.

Ren wouldn’t let her die. She never let a teammate die.

She was suddenly damn glad she was on a team with a woman with that kind of reputation.

“Sunbae!”

The water whip enclosed the Uchiha’s wrist, as he hadn’t expected the intrusion on their fight, but it was a second that Soo-Jung used to her advantage. Swinging in with her kunai, she slashed toward his neck, missing, but placing a nice gash on his arm.

Make that bastard think twice before fighting Kiri shinobi.

Two Konoha shinobi were behind her (which reminded her – the pink-haired chick and that team with the dog-boy got out of here, right? They weren’t in the area anymore…) and the younger one was glaring murder at their opponent.

“You dragged my younger brother into this, Riko-san? That was rather reckless.”

“Yo, ugly!” Soo-Jung sneered behind her mask. “Who the fuck is this Riko-chick you’re talking to?”

_“He’s talking to me, Soo-Jung. I’ll explain in-village. For now, just focus on the fight.”_

_“You have too many names, Sunbae. I’m holding you to that explanation, too.”_

Ren ducked into the fight, throwing a hit into Itachi’s side after using two feints – one for a right hook and the other for a push-kick to his chest. She didn’t celebrate long, getting out of his reach as fast as she could.

_“Get Jeong-Hwa and leave. I’ll follow you.”_

Soo-Jung nodded, launching herself toward their teammate and grabbing his body, running away from the fight.

Getting out from under Itachi, she prepared to leave.

“RIKO!” It was Sasuke, Kakashi was keeping Itachi occupied. “What about your team?”

“I’m helping them, Sasuke.”

“But –“

“Ask the Hokage. She’ll be more than happy to tell you, I’m sure.”

And she was gone.

It fucking burned, though, leaving Sasuke and Kakashi behind. Even if it was only to let her team regroup, it stung. 

* * *

Kakashi recognized the situation when she left - she was team leader, she couldn't let someone run off without making sure they were safe. He couldn't explain it to Sasuke midfight, though, so it would have to wait. 

Still, he hadn't thought she would come back, but she did, surrounding Itachi with the two remaining members of her team, the three of them taking personal offense to him doing harm to their other teammate, the one with the J-name. They really did have strange names, now that he thought about it. 

The commands she shouted weren't in Japanese, though, and that was stranger. All three of the shinobi seemed to understand each other perfectly, though, and there were jutsu and attacks flying around the Uchiha, who suddenly peered at the sky before shunshining away. All three of the hunter-nin were trying to sense him, just as Kakashi was, and he was sure Sasuke was. 

He was gone. 

Kakashi, for all he wanted to ask, decided against it, signalling Sasuke. If she was undercover, they may have already done enough damage. 

She had said to ask the Hokage, and he had every intention to do so. The first question? 

Whose fucking idea was it to send a twelve year old into a war zone? 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Maybe this is slightly rushed, but writing is supposed to be about writing what you want to read, and I really wanted this to also have the pe political implications, as well as personal struggles when it comes to Ren/Riko/Chae-Seon and her place in either village. She's just as loyal to her team assignments in Kiri as she is to Team 7, because ultimately they still have her back and she has to have theirs. 
> 
> There's a strong possibility she'll go back to Konoha in some capacity later, but not yet. 
> 
> I won't go too much into the rest of the Sunagakure arc, but I wanted to touch on it and use it as a way to bring these groups together, show some of the clash, and introduce some of the future conflicts that are going to pop up. 
> 
> I wanted to thank a reviewer from Chapter 1 who suggested a market culture that develops out of language contact and other factors - I love it, and am definitely considering including it, especially because of Ji-Su's background. 
> 
> Thanks so much for reading! This is the most fun I've had writing in a long time!


	4. Regrets Are Life's Way of Telling Us to Improve for the Future

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kakashi and Riko's family make an interesting conversational mix.   
> At least it wasn't as tense as it had been with Tsunade.

Ren and her team pulled the Konoha teams together before surrounding them to create a protective rim around them, and it was driving Genma up a wall. Even if he was pretty sure he knew one of them, he couldn’t stand being surrounded by foreign nin. It felt too much like they were being taken as war prisoners.

And as such, he was immediately relieved when their mission called for them to regroup in Suna, as Sakura and Team 9 had managed to recover the Kazekage with the help of several Suna shinobi.

Hopefully there was intel on Akatsuki from the fights that were had. Who knew? Maybe the Kiri shinobi would share their intel on Hoshigaki Kisame if Konoha gave over intel on Uchiha Itachi. Even if it wasn’t much, any piece of information could be vital.

The Kiri nin separated from the group, conversing in their language before a barked laugh from the white-haired one was followed by some shouting from the other three. Not entirely professional, but when the red-haired one in charge (he wasn’t sure what he felt about that being the Nara girl, so he just didn’t think about it. Besides, he had only met her a handful of times, maybe he was remembering her chakra signature wrong.) called them to attention, they all responded quickly and without a single protest.

Kakashi slipped beside him. “You noticed it too? She said we ought to ask the Hokage.”

Well, fuck. And hadn’t she mentioned they would be leaving soon?

This is why he never wanted to work near government. Send him on deadly missions any day, but don’t put him somewhere he has to make administrative decisions. It wasn’t for him and he wanted absolutely nothing to do with it. He didn’t want to be the one that risked screwing up peoples’ lives. No thank you.

* * *

Ren’s mission within Suna ended quickly, and it was made clear that she and her team were ‘welcome’ in the sense that they were too polite to turn out someone who had helped their ally, but they didn’t want shinobi from Kiri in their walls any longer than necessary.

The trip home was unremarkable, but Soo-Jung followed her home, insisting on her explanation. The argument that followed was... Colorful. They traded insults, threw out accusations they rightfully shouldn’t have, and then finally Suigetsu scolded them both for being childish. Ren wasn’t a traitor, the Mizukage knew full well there was a foreign shinobi serving within her ranks, and she had the complete trust not just of the Mizukage, but of everyone on her main team.

That had seemed enough, and while she was still tense around her, Soo-Jung had started spending more time around Ren.

“Seriously, I want to train my team, and if you’re following me around, it’s a distraction.”

“Eh, Chae-Seon-shi, I don’t think I need to remind you that I hold a secret of yours and I _don’t_ trust you. Would it really be such a bad idea to let me trail you a few days, see what I think?”

This girl was just bored. That was the only excuse Ren could think of for why she was _still_ following around.

“Besides, you’re molding the minds of the next generation of Kirigakure shinobi. Why shouldn’t I be worried?”

“You’re a pain in the ass, you know that?”

Soo-Jung let out the first bright smile Ren could recall seeing… not just from the girl, but probably one of the few since coming to Kiri. The death and destruction had kept smiles rare. “I pride myself on that, glad you finally noticed.

“You know, Soensaengnim talked about giving me a mission, but I declined. Said I wanted to trail you. Learn something about teaching so I could use it in the future. Guess you’re stuck with me, Chae-Seon.”

The flip in personality was slightly concerning, but not all together unexpected. No one was as strict of a person as they tended to be behind the uniform – hence some of the slips while on the Suna mission into more natural personalities – and Soo-Jung (even with her suspicions) had been a fairly relaxed, fun person throughout the mission.

Honestly? Ren should have seen it coming.

As they approached the field where Ren had switched their team training to, Soo-Jung threw her a scroll. “Besides. The Mizukage asked me to hand you this. You guys have had a couple local rebuild missions, but this one is further out, near some of the towns that got hit in the outbreak. She wants to get some of them rebuilt to get some positive lipservice from some of the civilians because your Genin are young and cute. I’m going with, but that’s mostly so there’s extra muscle in case anyone gets ideas about attacking your team.

“We leave in like a week, though, so get some training in with your team. Make sure they know what they’re heading into.” The civilians further out from the capital didn’t have the best idea of shinobi in general, but after the war public opinion was significantly lower than Mei had hoped.

“Thanks. You sure you want to come?”

“It’s this or being thrown in the Academy to teach because I ‘have self-destructive tendencies’ and ‘go on too many consecutive missions with too few breaks’ and Seonsaengnim thinks it would ‘mellow me out’, and honestly being in one place too long drives me up a wall.”

She wasn’t the only one. A lot of the shinobi who got shuffled around the different camps were antsy upon giving a place to stay long-term. Some just hid it better. 

* * *

Her students were sparring when she arrived. Though, she supposed, it would be more accurate to say Jae-Un was fighting whichever one came at her first, and the other two were learning to strategize around her.

Mi-Na perked up when she saw Ren. “Seonsaengnim!”

The other two stopped fighting when Mi-Na ran over. At some point she had become close with the three of them, and she smiled. It meant something, something she couldn't define, that they were happy to see her. “We’re heading on a mission in two weeks, alright? So I want the three of you to be training on your downtime, too, but _lightly_. We don’t need serious injuries just before an out-of-village mission.”

“Ne, Seonsaengnim!” Mi-Na pulled out her notebook. “Where are we going?”

Ren pulled out the scroll before answering, checking the name and location. “Nogeun-Ri. It’s a village to the west, near the dock towns.” She tapped the notebook before dictating the spelling. “You can look it up later if you want. We’re going to be there for a while helping with the rebuild, but you will also have chances to mingle with locals and build ties to the community outside of Kiri.

“Now you girls have been doing a great job with chakra control, so we’re going to start working with jutsu now. Ji-Su, Mi-Na, I can help you two with yours, since my natures are water and air. I have a scroll for you, Jae-Un, but I’m not sure how helpful I’ll be. Worse comes to worst and I track someone down to tutor you in earth jutsu. Sound fair?”

The girls, like many shinobi, were more than eager to start working with jutsu. Like many shinobi, they didn’t think too much about the techniques themselves until Ren pulled them aside.

“You guys aren’t going to get these right away, but I want all of you to think about the practical applications. Tomorrow I expect a short written list.

“Tomorrow we’re going to be rolling, so make sure you’re wearing things you can get dirty.”

“Understood, seonsaengnim!” Jae-Un bowed the girls out before departing. Something about her had been uneasy the whole day, and while Ren had noticed it, she was hesitant to act. They all had baggage, best she wait for her student. If it continued, she would be having a lengthy discussion with her pupil.

* * *

She was two steps away from killing Suigetsu and making sure he stayed dead. The lightning arced up her arm, burning and feeling like it was literally ripping at her chakra. Haku had checked repeatedly, but it wasn’t doing any significant damage other than the strain of using an element she wasn’t familiar or natural with.

She was trying to sustain it longer, though, and despite the pain, she had managed a solid ten seconds before the lightning collapsed toward her arms again, dissipating.

She was breathing heavily when Suigetsu walked over. “You’re getting there. You still need some practice, though. Are you okay?”

She was still flinching from the burning sensation. How did Sasuke and Kakashi-sensei use this stuff so regularly like it wasn’t a problem?

“I literally burn myself on a daily basis for you, you asshole. No, I’m not fi-“ There must have been residual lightning chakra in her system, because she felt herself jerk forward and the same burning sensation she felt when she used lightning chakra. She found it hard to breath a moment, and coughed her breaths until she could speak. “No. I’m not fucking fine.”

Suigetsu had gotten tense. “I’m not sure we’re doing this right. That shouldn’t happen…”

“No shit.”

“I’m serious, Deongsaeng. That’s… I’ve never seen a lightning user react like that.”

Ren couldn’t have cared any less at that moment. She coughed through another spasm before gulping in as much oxygen as she could from where she was kneeling on the ground.

Haku was gone, so he couldn’t check her over, and Chojuro had been called for a mission over two hours before. As far as she knew, he was long gone.

Suigetsu’s arms were under hers, lifting her up and throwing her over his shoulder. “I’m taking you to the hospital. This is… This is really worrying, Deongsaeng.”

Ren didn’t have the strength to protest or speak, too busy focusing on breathing.

So much for no serious injuries right before a mission.

* * *

“She’s not a lightning user?”

Suigetsu shook his head. The medics had sedated Ren and put her in a room to be observed. She had minimal damage to her chakra coils, but some of the tissues in her body were reacting poorly to the lightning around it.

“I mean, she can use it fine, it’s just not her affinity.”

“Have her manifest her chakra around her to look lightning next time before she manipulates it into lightning.” The doctor was older, and it showed then, in the way he regarded Suigetsu. “I’ve met others who decided to take on lightning as a third element, and they had a similar problem. When they’re learning they’re so anxious to get lightning, they don’t realize that the way they manipulate it isn’t letting them control it or protecting their body from it.

“Making the chakra look like lightning out of the body before manipulating it isn’t exactly an official technique, but it’s what I’ve seen work in the past. Make sure you keep an eye on her, though. There was some light damage to the lungs and muscles because of how concentrated the chakra became. The coils are meant for that kind of abuse, especially in a shinobi who’s been doing chakra techniques for years, but the muscles aren’t as able to take long doses of concentrated chakra circulating through them. Even ten seconds can do damage if you aren’t careful.”

Suigetsu nodded. “Is this my fault, because I was pushing her?”

“She could have said no. She could have stopped, but she didn’t. I think you shinobi are a stubborn, stubborn lot.

“Just make sure to take it easy with the lightning, getting the chakra to manifest first, and make sure she’s getting some fluid and taking this,” he passed Suigetsu a bottle of medicine, “for the next few days. She should be fine soon. The muscle damage was bad, but it wasn’t as bad as I’ve seen before. It’ll recover fine, just make sure she’s not pushing it too hard with the lightning. If she goes on a mission, she shouldn't use it at all, and she should take it as easy as she can on her muscles.”

“Understood.”

* * *

Suigetsu hated that his teammate, his Deongsaeng, was in the hospital because of something he had inadvertently caused.

He hated even more telling the Mizukage about it. Mei looked down at her desk, concerned.

“Should we even be thinking about training her up for the Kiba if she’s reacted like this?”

Zabuza leaned back. “If that’s what you’re worried about then we might as well not give her one of the swords. She’s too slight for the Kabutowari, and the others are taken. Unless you think she’s suddenly able to defeat Kisame, your plans for her are screwed.”

Ao grunted before replying. “He’s right. It’s either this or you send her back without one. Either way, I’m pretty sure she can handle it. She’s an annoying brat, but she’s tough as nails.”

Suigetsu waited until he was sure the conversation had stalled. “The doctor said she could learn to do it, but she needed to take it easy. I’m pretty sure we could have her on the Kiba quick enough if you let her start using it earlier than we originally planned. Maybe having something that channels lightning chakra – once she gets the basics down – would help.”

Mei looked out the window. “It could help, but it could also just make things worse.”

She paused.

“Suigetsu, how likely is Ren to say something if the Kiba swords are slowly killing her?”

“She wouldn’t. She’d be honored you trusted her and wouldn’t speak against it. She’d take it as a point of pride and try to find a way around it.”

“Are you willing to take responsibility? If she’s hiding something and you don’t catch it, it could be fatal. We need to go into this with our eyes open. This is your comrade, your sister-in-arms. Can you be responsible for watching that she doesn’t hide something serious?”

“We live together, Seonsaengnim. Our whole team does. And her Genin pestered Chojuro about it while we were on our last mission together. Even if I don’t catch it, someone will.”

Mei looked to Zabuza and Ao, an understanding passing through the three of them. “Alright. We’ll go with your plan. You’ll decide when she’s ready, and then you’ll give her the swords. Until that time, you’ll continue training her on lightning chakra. Are we understood?”

Suigetsu nodded, bowing as he was dismissed.

What had he just done?

* * *

Kakashi enjoyed pestering people and annoying them as much as any other jounin did, but even he recognized when it was necessary to be serious. Sitting in front of the Hokage, demanding answers why one of his students was serving in the elite positions of another village’s black-ops division was definitely one of those times.

Even if the temptation was there to mess with Tsunade for payback, he had to stay focused on the matter at hand.

“Hatake, I’ve told you as much as I’m going to tell you, now get out of my office!”

Kakashi remained seated where he was. “Not until I get a good explanation for the logic behind sending a twelve-year-old into an active war-zone.”

“We did it all the time in the ninja wars, or have you forgotten?”

“We aren’t at war, Tsunade! We don’t have to send our children into one just for the hell of it! What if she had gotten killed? Were you going to be the one to explain that to her teammates? What about her family? Or were you going to let me do it for you?

“She was twelve years old. There had to be another option!”

“There wasn’t. Now get. Out.” Tsunade hadn't looked up from her desk. She had paperwork in front of her, but she hadn't moved it. Kakashi suspected that was just for show. 

“What if she comes back broken? You remember the wars. I remember the wars. I was that age _in_ the wars. It messed a lot of people up Tsunade. What are you going to do then?

“What about that language the Kiri shinobi speak? Are you going to rip her brain open so you can learn it and use it for intelligence gathering purposes? At what point do you stop and think that these are human beings, not senseless tools?”

“They are soldiers, Kakashi, and you would do well to remember that. Now get out of my office before I have you removed by force.”

“Whatever damage has been done to her, emotionally or physically, I hold you responsible for.”

He was bluffing. He would hold himself as responsible, and he knew it. If he had known, had checked about the arrangements made for his other student, he could have prevented this. But he wanted information, and if a guilt trip was the only way he was going to get it, it was worth a try.

“Get out, Hatake.”

He walked out without the information he wanted, but he knew another source that might have something.

* * *

Nara Yoshino wasn’t the biggest fan of her daughter’s teacher. She knew his reputation both for laziness and for reading that poor excuse for literature, even in front of his students. If she knew from an unnamed source that he had gotten her daughter into it, well, that was a fight for another day.

Seeing him walk up through the compound, escorted by a disinterested Chie, she fought the urge to pull out her water whip and run him through the gauntlet. She didn’t want to give him the technique, anyway, with that damn Sharingan.

“Hatake-san. How may I help you?”

His smile would be disarming to a civilian, given his reputation, but Yoshino was a shinobi as much as she was a mother. She wasn’t fooled. “I believe I ran into your daughter on my latest mission.”

Ah. That’s what this was about. “Does she have any titles other than Bloody Flower, then, or are you just here to share information that I already know?” Chie looked intrigued at the mention of her cousin, her eyebrows pulling in like she was trying to piece together a strategy or a complex puzzle.

“I believe I heard the term ‘sunbae’ used, but I’m not sure. The Kiri team switched languages a lot.”

Yoshino froze a second before considering the words of ‘English’ she had heard Riko an Shikamaru use when they were younger (they may have been future shinobi, but children weren’t exactly sly), and she couldn’t recall ever hearing ‘sunbae’ as one of them.

“You said she was called the Bloody Flower. Am I to assume her undercover identity is Akagi Ren?”

Yoshino sighed. She wasn’t getting rid of this man anytime soon, not if the topic for discussion was her wayward daughter. “Why don’t you come in. I’ll make us some tea.

“And Chie-chan, how about you go find Shikaku for me, hmm? Tell him I said it was important.”

There was a system in the Nara family for ranking how quickly someone needed to respond when called. ‘Important’ meant, come if you can, but if something else is immediately pressing finish that first. Urgent was a step up, but still allowed a slight hesitation; something along the lines of come when possible, find a stopping point on what you’re working on. Emergency was the one used most sparingly, for obvious reasons. Drop what you were doing and run, was what emergency generally meant.

Chie caught on, nodding before she took off.

Kakashi followed Yoshino into the kitchen of the house, sitting at the table when prompted. “So what do you know, Nara-san?”

“I know what was in the file Shukaku brought home, but that’s about it. I know she has the respect of her peers, I know she’s a good fighter. I know that whatever happened at Sapphire Lake messed her up, but her report was succinct. She probably won’t want to talk about it, even after she gets back.”

“And knowing Tsunade,” Kakashi made a face as he talked about the Hokage, “She’s going to want to drag it out of her. What else?”

“I know that she’s got people who care about her, I know she has a reputation.”

“Yeah, as the Bloody Flower.” Kakashi didn't speak as though he had an opinion one way or the other, but if Yoshino had to guess, there was definitely something to it that suggested he wasn't exactly comfortable with his own student having a reputation like he had. 

“But also for keeping teammates alive, even if it means putting the mission on hold. I should thank you, Hatake. I have no doubt you taught her that.” The missions were never listed as failed, but instead 'Incomplete', something the Mizukage had signed off on each time, citing that she had saved her teammates. 

Kakashi looked uncomfortable at the indirect praise. By all accounts, he probably was. While details were hazy, it was no secret that the mission Obito died on was one of the ones that did the most damage to his psyche. Being thrown in ANBU so soon after likely didn’t help.

“She specialized in assassination after that, and it would seem she got very good at it.”

Kakashi choked a bit, meeting Yoshino’s eyes. “She hates killing, though.”

Yoshino shrugged. “You’d have to ask her.

“Speaking of, Hatake, what was she like on the battlefield?” Kakashi hesitated before answering. He staggered the beginnings of a response before Yoshino interrupted him. “Don’t worry about making me angry, I’m just asking as a mother. She’ll need support when she comes back, and I want to know what I’m getting into.”

Shikaku had come in quietly and was standing at the entrance of the kitchen. No doubt Kakashi knew he was there, but this was important.

“She was a good fighter. Strong, but also quick. She was loyal to her team and focused on making sure they sustained the least damage possible while they finished the mission.

“I can say without a doubt I am extremely proud to call her my student.”

Yoshino smiled, hearing that. She had read the reports, but hearing it from someone who had trained her when she was young and then went on to fight alongside her meant something more. This man knew her as a child, and from what she could tell he still knew the young woman he worked alongside, she had just changed a bit.

“Thank you, Hatake. I believe my husband can answer any other questions you have.”

Shikaku came in, nodding at Kakashi as he walked past him to sit beside Yoshino, who stood to grab the water for tea. She had left it to boil manually, opting into the conversation instead, and now she could listen in as she prepared it.

“You want to know about my daughter?”

“I want to know about my student.”

Well, this conversation was going to be interesting.

* * *

Shikamaru walked in to shouts between his sister’s teacher and his father.

How troublesome.

Instead of engaging, he opted for walking toward his mom, passing her a message from the Hokage. It was a hospital report form from Kirigakure, with a translation attached behind it. There weren’t medical records for Riko, but this had happened inside the village, where, according to the note, there wasn’t as much a strain for resources and they could afford to make a report for emergency cases.

Yeah. His sister collapsing and having spasms or seizures (he wasn’t sure which. The translation didn’t specify) was an emergency. His mom scanned it quickly, pulling out the important details. “What was she doing using lightning chakra?”

Shikamaru shrugged. “Don’t ask me. Hokage-sama handed it to me when my team reported on our mission earlier. Told me you could add it to the file in my room.”

Evidently that was the wrong thing to say, because his father and Hatake – both of whom he was sure had been listening in, if only a little, turned. His dad looked pissed that he had mentioned the file, and Hatake looked curious. Damn him. Why’d he open his mouth?

“File?”

“Shikamaru…”

“I’m going to my room now.” Going and napping was definitely his only safe option. “I’ll take that.” His mom passed him the paper, nodding at him.

Yeah, if his mom was telling him to go and sleep the rest of the day away, he definitely needed to be out of there. He needed to be out of there five minutes ago.

“See you on the road of life, or some crap.” He waved a limp hand at them as he backed out of the room. 

The way his father cringed and Hatake’s face scrunched was satisfaction enough, but knowing that Riko would love hearing this story when she got back? Well, he had started that journal in his room for a reason.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Nogeun-ri is the name of an actual village in Korea. I googled it to get some ideas, but until I can come up with something better, I was gonna use Nogeun-Ri. 
> 
> "Rolling" is a jiu-jitsu term. It's when you do ground work. Ground work is when you work with a partner to try and pin/choke the other person into tapping out (also called "submitting").


	5. Building Houses and Building Teams Aren't Too Different

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ren ignores some advice from her doctors, Tsuande wonders just what kind of hot mess will (one day) return, and Yoshino begins to bring Ren home in whatever way she can.

Kiri was a set of islands surrounding the main island, and each of the islands of Kiri were unique. Each one had its own sense of the culture of Kiri, its own dialect of Korean, and (to some extent) its own climate. The islands closer to the Land of Honey were typically colder, and the further north the more bitter the winters. The ones that were closer to the Land of Fire were warmer. The islands that were close to the Land of FIre also had a lot more Japanese mixed into their Korean.

The island Ren was taking her team to was one of those islands. They had gotten caught in the crossfire when the war broke out, being close to trading ports, which could have thrown the war in either side’s favor, but nothing had been done as of yet to help them rebuild.

They arrived mid-morning, Ren having done what she could to hasten the trip. The locals weren’t very trusting, but that was a given. No one in Kiri was after the last Mizukage and the war that had just ended. “Ji-Su, we’re going to rely on you for a lot of the diplomatic parts of this mission.”

“Ne, Seonsaengnim.”

Jae-Un glanced around the village they were in. She had been distinctly uncomfortable since they got on this island, though her teammates didn’t seem to notice it. She had an excellent talent for masking her emotions.

“Soo-Jung, keep an eye on Ji-Su and Mi-Na, yeah?”

The other woman huffed a breath, acknowledging the barely whispered request. “Get that girl in shape, Sunbae. If she’s compromised, she’s a liability.”

“She’s a kid, Soo-Jung.”

“Yeah. And she’s a shinobi. She knew what she was signing up for, so if she can’t cram that emotional shit down, she needs to learn fast. This region isn’t exactly friendly. Or did you forget?”

Ren didn’t gratify her with a response.

She was right, after all. Even if she didn’t want to admit it, these girls knew what they were signing up for. They were all left destitute by the war, and they had seen the effects of war beyond that, so they knew that they were signing up for a life of emotional suppression and risking their lives. Soo-Jung took her silence as a prompt to move toward the other two and push them towards a local farmer to make them ask what needed done.

While the other two were busy stumbling through the language with locals – which Ren would have to address later – she pulled Jae-Un towards her. “What’s going on?”

“Nothing, Seonsaengnim!” She refused to meet Ren’s eyes. “I – It’s nothing, really.”

Ren recognized that look. If they were still fighting a war, she would demand an answer because if personal issues bled into the battlefield it could cost a life. But this girl was a kid who had lived through the war and didn’t have to fight it anymore. Ren could only hope Jae-Un would come to her when she was ready.

“I’m here if you need me. Let me know, alright? That’s what I’m here for.”

Jae-Un nodded, not meeting her eyes. Instead she was watching the people around her, looking like underneath her bravado and all her control, she wanted to cry. “Thanks, Choi-Seonsaengnim.”

“If you’re coming to me with something personal, please, just use Chae-Seon. Okay?”

Jae-Un nodded again, wiping at her face. “I’m going to walk with the other girls, if that’s okay?”

“Always, Hakseng. Always.”

Her team was walking ahead of her, where she could see all of them. The village they were going to work in for the next two weeks was just a little ways ahead, already somewhat visible. She could keep them safe, she could protect them. They were hers, and she would do what she could to keep these three – these three children who were counting on her to watch out for them and take care of them to at least some extent as much as they were counting on her to teach them – safe. She could keep them out of harm’s way, at least for the time being.

And that brought such a warm feeling to her chest that she couldn’t help but think it was a good thing she had been given a Genin team. It was rewarding to teach them. Maybe they hadn’t learned new jutsu and cool moves in the last few weeks, but they had gone from being able to walk on water only when they were focusing to being able to do it as easily as walking or fighting on land. They had learned to start manipulating their chakra, and she had found scrolls for the three of them for their respective elements.

She had watched them change slightly. They no longer looked nervous, like the first attack would have them killed. They learned to fight together as a team with minimal conflict.

She was going to keep watching these girls. They were as precious to her as her team back home, as her team here. As Seonsaengnim. As her family.

God, what was she going to do when it was time to go back?

* * *

She had been warned. She had been told to take it easy.

She also wasn’t the teacher to make her students do all the work while she lazed about. Especially not when they needed any and all positive image they could get in this area. The civil war was over, but there were still civilians to win over to the new regime, and she had to show a positive force in the process of rebuilding.

But every night she hurt worse and worse. She wouldn’t say anything, lest she set Soo-Jung or her students off that something was wrong, but it was harder and harder to get up in the morning.

 _Shut the fuck up, Chae-Seon. You’ve had worse_.

Akagi Ren had been what she was when she was going back. Now that her placement seemed more permanent, she had started, without realizing, to sink more into Choi Chae-Seon, and there was something kinder about that than Akagi Ren. Choi Chae-Seon was allowed to laugh, cry, to feel, where Akagi Ren – an identity always meant to be discarded – had become a shell of armor around her.

As her eyes cracked open, she glanced at the clock.

_4:00 AM_

Rolling and pushing herself up, she kicked the person next to her lightly. “Soo-Jung-shi. Get up.”

“Not now, Sunbae… too early.”

“You’re a shinobi. You signed up to get up early.”

Ren ignored the curses lobbed in her direction as Soo-Jung sat up, glaring a hole through her head. “Why?”

“Why what?”

“Why are you saying that? That I signed up for this? I thought it was gonna be cool shit, not getting up at four in the morning!”

“You didn’t have to come with us, you know.”

“But I didn’t want to be stuck in-village.”

“Soo-Jung,” Ren glared, “We’ve gotta get up. Come on.”

Soo-Jung didn’t fight much more than a sentence or two at a time. She was definitely a fighter, so her career fit her, but she seemed to restrain herself, even if it made her uncomfortable to do so. Ren didn’t know much about her, but she had heard she came from a more conservative area of Mizu no Kuni. If that was true, it would make sense that fighting authority was drilled into her as a strict ‘no’. Add in a war where it was dangerous to question the authority too much, and it was bound to make the freedom of peace a little harder to bear.

That made integrating everyone into the new regime even harder. Some of the more remote communities knew there was a war, but they didn’t know who won or that there was a new Kage. Some of them didn’t even care, but there still needed to be an effort to get them integrated into the country, if only for the image of solidarity.

They were staying in an abandoned house on the edge of Nogeun-Ri, the villagers not having any places open for someone to stay. The damage done throughout the war had started to be repaired, but many of the people of the village had been caught in the cross-fire and were left maimed or dead. Of those still alive and whole, there were still youth and elders that couldn’t help.

The village nearby, Kochmur-Ri, had been razed to the ground.

Ren pulled herself into the room where her genin were staying and nudged Mi-Na, who was closest to her. “Come on, girls. Get up.”

The three groaned as they pulled themselves up, their night clothes and hair all in slight disarray. Jae-Un glanced around, not really responding to her environment as she went through the motions of getting dressed. This was an everyday thing, ever since they came to this village. She was distant in the mornings, and focused only on the task at hand during the day.

Ji-Su was doing her best to be diplomatic, but the amount of Japanese that mixed into the local speech made it hard, as she hadn’t had much in the way of Japanese education under her family.

Mi-Na seemed to thrive. While she used the standard Korean, she was bubbly and sociable in a way she wasn’t usually during training. She had made a few friends among the younger generation, many of whom took to her putting together new plans for how to lift beams and supplies to where they needed to be with a curious gleam.

“Seonsaengnim, can I head out now?” Mi-Na had loved the work they were doing over the past few days.

They still had a week and a half here, so Ren would have to watch how she was handling it later.

Nodding, Ren motioned Ji-Su out of the room, signaling to Soo-Jung as she closed the door. Despite their routine morning spats, once she was up the arguments and fights seemed to be pushed aside in favor of just working through the day and/or harassing Ren.

Yeah, something told her she had just made yet another troublesome friend.

She seemed to have a habit of doing that.

Grabbing Jae-Un’s shoulder, the girl tensed up, eyes widening before snapping her shoulder out from under her teacher’s grasp, a kunai out and in her hand, only to be removed within seconds.

“They assign you a jounin teacher for a reason, you know. I told you to come to me if you had problems.”

“I’m fine, seonsaengnim. Trust me. I… I’m fine. I’m just tired is all. When we get back, would you mind… nevermind. Don’t worry about me, seonsaengnim. ”

The way she spoke was characteristic of the area. Slightly more even rhythm, and she didn’t miss the drop in of some Japanese in the statement (the Japanese that had been adopted into this dialect was still altered slightly, but it was noticeable if one listened for it).

She must have been from nearby.

“You’re from around here?”

“I mean, yeah, but it’s not that big a deal, I promise.”

Ren pushed down lightly on Jae-Un’s shoulders before sitting in front of her. “You can’t take on the world alone. It’s just not something anyone can do.” Forget she had been trying for nearly three years, and was a total hypocrite, Ren still knew when she needed other people. “Learn from me, kid. Don’t repeat my mistakes. You’ve got a team out there, and if you ask, I am almost positive that they would have your back. Give it a year, and guess what.

“Those two girls will be at your side without so much as a question. You guys work well together. But if something is bothering you, I have no doubt that it will show when you guys are working. Let someone help, even if it’s not me.”

Jae-Un tensed up before standing. “I’m gonna go get to work, seonsaengnim.”

“Alright.”

Ren wished she knew what to do for her student, but if one thing could definitively be said for Jae-Un it was that if she wanted to keep something private there was no way to get her to admit so much as a word of it. 

* * *

Tsunade hated the entire situation with Kiri. Pulling out her own soldier could cause an international incident because she was an instructor now, and worse, the girl had gotten attached.

Mei had forwarded along photographs that had Riko in them. Included was a photograph of a Genin team playing cards in an apartment, two recognizable Jounin also in the background. The three girls were all smiling at the camera, all with sharp looks in their eyes, ready to challenge the world.

And Riko...

She was leaning against a couch, cards in her hand. Her hand was up lazily, waving at the camera. The seals hiding her appearance did a good job, but that keen look, that posture… that was all Nara (though something about the way she held her hand reeked of Kakashi, and if she had another emotional mess of a jounin coming back to her village that she would have to deal with she was going to kill someone). There was a seal tattooed on her wrist. Her clothes were cheap but durable – the kind shinobi wore in wars, when things weren’t going to last as long.

She seemed relaxed the way a shinobi was when they were in a space that was ‘home’. It wasn’t the true relaxation like could be seen in civilians, but her muscles weren’t tensed, and she wasn’t worried about the person behind her while she was turned towards the camera. From what Tsunade could see of the house, there was a décor that could only be attributed to the long-haired boy (Haku, according to the letter from her fellow Kage), as he was the only one that looked put together enough and elegant enough to have decided to try and furnish and decorate what was clearly a spartan-style shinobi apartment. There were books everywhere, though, and there were also a few pieces of paper with notes on them. The writing seemed to go between a neat Korean script (now that she had a name for the language, she had to wonder if maybe she had done something irreversible. Another language? Another culture? She hadn’t even known something like that existed in Kirigakure) and a script that, while having become slightly scratchier and more slanted, was clearly Riko’s from what she could make out of spats of Japanese on one on the edge of a chair in the corner of the photo.

There were a few more, one from a festival where Riko was wearing a strange gown. That one kept her attention longer. Her hitai-ite was tied around her neck, tucked under the collar of the dress, which fell on her body differently than kimonos ever had, and which covered some of the scars she could see in other photos.

She was pulling Hoozuki Suigetsu behind her and she seemed to blend into the entire environment fine. She looked like someone at a festival with friends, enjoying herself. She looked like part of the city as much as she looked like part of the culture.

The public ones had been taken, according to Mei, by a trustworthy photographer who had originally just been taking photos of the festival before she asked him to snap pictures of the four whenever he saw them around, if it wasn’t an inconvenience at the time. There were two of them at a bar, one where they were laughing and one where they were glaring at the photographer (this one had a small note on the back that the photographer had survived, though the four of them had started trying to mess with him if they saw him in the streets after that).

There was one from the marketplace, where another woman, this one with dark brown hair, was leaning next to her, the smile on her face reminding her of all the times Jiraiya would do similar, egging on Orochimaru or herself as they went about their errands. This one had one of the most recent dates written on it.

The one in the house had been taken by Hoozuki – which likely explained the slight slant to the photo, if his reputation for being slash-and-dash was anything to go by – and seemed to be a lot more natural, even if it wasn’t candid.

These were, however, proof that she was alive, that she was well, and –

Wait.

She flipped back to a picture from earlier in the pile before pausing.

“SHIZUNE!”

The door opened. “Yes, Shishou?”

“Go get that hospital document for Riko for me.”

“The original or the copy? We sent the original to the Nara compound…”

“The copy will be fine.”

The paper was on her desk in a moment, and she pulled it out. She had skimmed, marking the reason she had been admitted as abnormal, but had figured it was just a misreport or another case of a shinobi getting too excited and trying something without preparing properly first.

But those scars on the picture…

There were a few of them that were close enough to showcase them, one of which was the one in the apartment. There was one of her walking with her Genin team, and another, close up, her arms braced, her sword in her hands (and something about the sword was oddly familiar, too, though she knew she hadn’t seen it with Riko before), braced against the Nuibari, her the expressions on her and her opponent’s faces ones that spoke of a long line of friendly challenges.

Tsunade looked closer at the scars. The earliest photo had to be the one with her Genin team in the streets. They only barely past her wrist, and were hardly noticeable, but being taken professionally, they were a lot clearer than the next one, the one from the apartment.

In that one they went up her forearm, almost reaching her elbow at their farthest edge. The patterns looked like lightning chakra, as was to be expected.

The third one, the one in the fight, they were past her elbow, and if Tsunade had to guess, dangerously close to the seals modifying her appearance. If she wasn’t careful, they could mar the surface and she’d be screwed.

The hospital report claimed muscle damage from using lightning natured chakra improperly. The scars told Tsunade that it wasn’t just improperly, it was repeatedly, over the course of several weeks, ignoring the stabbing pain that _should have told her to stop_.

“Nara Riko, if you come back in a body bag I’ll never forgive you.”

The fact she had kept going just told her the girl had become even more stubborn.

There was a scar she could see, even with some of the damage done over it, of a human jaw over her arm. That one she wanted a look at, because it didn’t look like it was properly healed. There were several others, including one by her collar, and Tsunade had to wonder just how much combat she’d seen. Certainly more than Tsunade had expected.

The mission report from Sapphire Lake had been too matter of fact and abrupt to learn much about how the girl reacted to trauma. Her other mission reports were short, as well, but as though she were trying to avoid using more paper than necessary. Overall, there wasn’t a lot to be gained from looking at the intel sent from Kiri other than that she had gone on to do a lot more than they had initially planned for her.

“Shizune!”

The woman was by her side in a moment.

“Take these to Nara Yoshino, tell her they can be added to the file.”

Shizune nodded, bowing as she left. As the door closed, Tsunade looked out the window, facing the direction of the Land of Water.

One of her own was out there, and it was too late to change the past.

Beginning a letter to the Mizukage, she began planning for the future.

* * *

 

Kakashi liked the new girl, don’t get him wrong. Uzumaki Karin was an excellent motivator for Naruto, and Sasuke didn’t seem to have any issues with her before or now.

But there was something clearly different in their team dynamic, and Kakashi wasn’t sure how he liked that. She hadn’t been told much about Riko until Naruto had started babbling to his new ‘Nee-san’ about his best friend and suddenly the girl was trying her hardest to live up to the former red-head on their team.

That was an impossible bar to set for herself, though, and Kakashi could tell she knew it. She wasn’t a kenjutsu user, she didn’t use senbon, and she didn’t dive into a fight with the same precision-based strategy that Riko was known for. She wasn’t Riko.

Karin had her own strengths. She was loyal (much like Riko, though Kakashi was trying to discourage comparisons), she was well-versed and steadily learning more in the field of medical jutsu, and she liked to boost morale. She was personable, and despite her background she smiled a lot and welcomed the team to any sort of event, whether it was buying more kunai or going to get lunch.

Kakashi watched the three of them work on their individual assignments, smiling at this team. He felt guilty for not looking out for his third student, but looking into the reputation she had cultivated for herself he could at least take some comfort knowing she was safe.

“Maa, students, you can stop now.”

“Hey, Kakashi-sensei, when do you think Ri-chan’ll be back, huh?” Naruto asked almost every day, but Kakashi never answered.

Kakashi sighed. “Naruto, I don’t know when Riko-chan will be coming back from her training mission. Perhaps you should bother Hokage-sama about it.”

The light that popped into Naruto's eyes promised a fiery retribution from Tsunade. It wasn't helped that Karin was excited to meet her cousin's best friend and seemed to mirror his excitement to pester Lady Tsunade. 

Oh well. Not his problem what his student does in his off time.

* * *

Yoshino was glad for the pictures, even if seeing her daughter scarred and war-hardened hurt her heart. She knew when Riko went into the Academy that this was a possibility, but she had hoped she would at least be there to help her.

Sighing, she smiled at the picture in the apartment. Even if diplomacy made it hard to bring her back to the village, she was pleased to know her daughter had a network of people who supported her. That would have to get her through for now, and she had an idea how she could use it to help Shikaku too.

Digging an old frame out of storage, she put the photo inside and put it up in the family’s communal space.

Next to other pictures of Riko and Shikamaru, this one stood out. It was a woman, not a girl. She'd have to take one or two of Shikamaru soon to match this. 

Maybe she could sneak one while he was with Temari one of these days... 

Looking at the smiling faces, Yoshino had to wonder what RIko's teammates were like. Maybe one day she’d meet them.


	6. Growth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mei and Tsunade might just be developing a good relationship.   
> Ren and her Genin might not know much about Jae-Un, but there is a good chance they might learn more.   
> Soo-Jung is just here for a good time.

Mei was baffled. The letters she had been receiving from the Hokage lately had largely been regarding their shared soldier. Questions regarding any kind of medical records (of which there were none, which caused a rather… strained exchange), regarding any other mission history (which Mei hadn’t been willing to hand over, though she suspected Tsunade understood that some of those missions had to remain as classified as possible), and general progress as a shinobi. With the reports and her little plan for Ren, she had no doubt the girl was a shoe-in for a jounin position upon her return.

This one was different. It had the usual inquiries and diplomatic motions, but it also contained the first step to cementing a relationship between the two villages, though. The first one that said they wanted to do anything to keep the two allies, at least as long as they were in peace times.

_At your earliest convenience, I would like to meet and discuss sending a shinobi to learn your Korean language. I believe relations between our villages, and nations, will be significantly improved if we find a way to reach understandings in both of our native languages._

“Well I’ll be damned.”

If she hadn’t sent him on a mission, she would have waved it in Ao’s face, laughing even as he undoubtedly just continued to be a downer. They were making progress with Konoha, and that was enough of a reason to celebrate, in her opinion.

Maybe she could get her favorite red head to share a drink with her when she got back from her mission. Until then, though, she had a fellow Kage to talk to.

* * *

Soo-Jung was going to drive her up a wall, she swore that girl was going to die, and if she wasn’t careful she would…

A hand grabbed her sleeve. Ji-Su. “Seonsaengnim, I don’t think killing your friend will help.”

“I’m not going to kill her. Just maim her enough that some wild animals come looking.”

“You gotta catch me first, Sunbae!” Soo-Jung was on top of one of the buildings they were rebuilding, dancing around with a look of glee on her face. “And to do that you’d have to, you know, actually move!”

Her pain had gotten worse, and while she could ignore it, it made fooling Soo-Jung much harder than fooling her genin.

“What’s she talking about Seonsaengnim?” Mi-Na poked her side.

At least Jae-Un was smiling. She had been getting quieter and more reserved the longer they stayed.

“Nothing, Hakseng. Come on, let the crazy person yell and dance, we’ve got work to do.”

“Hey, it’s not my fault most of the jounin in this country are fucked up beyond belief.” Soo-Jung was suddenly beside her and threw an arm around her. _Painfully._ “Besides, it’s not like you’ve got mental health that’s so stellar yourself, ya know.”

“Yes, I’m more than aware that the psych ward has a running file on me.”

It was true. She had never been committed, but after some of the more… some of her missions, she had heard they kept tabs on her behavior and mission reports to make sure she wasn’t about to go off the deep-end. Apparently, when Mei had heard word of the Uchiha Massacre all those years ago, it had impacted her. Now that she had power, she had set it up that those who were competent enough and had been emotionally compromised in the line of duty were kept under watch. If they were deemed a potential danger they were either put on mandatory administrative leave or removed from the force. Both options came with armed guards.

Even Kirigakure had lines they never wanted crossed.

The civilians in this town still didn’t implicitly trust the shinobi in their borders, much less other shinobi, but they seemed to have warmed up to them in the last few weeks.

Oh the magic of fresh-faced, starry-eyed genin. There was something to be said for Mei’s idea to send the occasional genin team on the rebuilding missions.

They were technically B-Ranked because of the damage done during the war and the lack of trust from and for the civilians in some areas. When her genin were ready for the Chuunin exams it would serve them well to have a couple of these higher ranked missions to pad their resumes. The other kages wouldn’t necessarily be eager to send a Kiri team up a rank, but it would be hard to deny a team with a solid mission record and good performance.

Jae-Seon grabbed some supplies and started towards her work, elbowing Ren lightly in the side. “Take a rest, seonsaengnim! We’ve got this!”

“You say that now, but-“

“No buts, seonsaengnim, you’re taking the day off!”

One of the older women smiled at the exchange, laying a hand on Ren’s shoulder (which she fastidiously avoided reacting to) as she said, “I would listen to them, young lady. You’re not going to win this one.”

The woman walked off, Soo-Jung watching her go as she leaned in and whispered about “damned nosy ajumas” and punched Ren in the shoulder. “Well, Chae-Seon, you’re off the clock and I’m here to make sure you stay that way. Come on.”

Chae-Seon didn’t move. Instead, she shrugged her friend’s hand off. “Nah. I’m helping.”

“No. You’re not.”

The resulting fight didn’t last very long.

One of these days, Chae-Seon would start listening to doctors. But it was not today.

* * *

Iruka fidgeted outside the Hokage’s office. There was no way he had messed up. Had he? He had a few clan kids in his class, did he accidentally offend one of them?

Oh god. He was screwed.

“Relax, Umino-san.” Shizune looked up from her filing. She was in from the hospital this morning, and Iruka had to wonder if it was Tsunade’s way of making her take a break. “I know for a fact you have nothing to worry about!”

Somehow, that wasn’t very comforting.

* * *

Yep. Not comforting at all. Instead of getting to keep his comfortable teaching job that he was actually good at, he was being given a promotion to jounin so he qualified to go to another village and work towards a peace pact with them, because that was an excellent use of his skills.

Absolutely not.

“Are you sure about this Hokage-sama? I appreciate your faith in me, but don’t you think it’s maybe...”

“A little misplaced?” Tsunade arched an eyebrow. “I’ll admit, my jounin commander wasn’t sure you would be good for the job. He had his reservations, particularly about your lack of field experience.

“But if we want this peace to last we have to make peace with the people, not just the village. And where we are right now, none of our people can communicate with the average person there. They have their own language, and if we want to start bridging a gap, we need to teach the next generation.

“You’ll be staying with an undercover of ours in Kiri, if everything goes to plan, and you’ll be learning the language from her and her roommates.”

“Undercover? We have someone in _Kiri?_ Does the Mizukage know we’re spying while we try to make a peace pact? Should we have sent someone this soon after the war? Hokage-sama-“

“Umino,” Tsunade levelled a harsh glare at him. “You don’t need to worry about our politics. Everything was worked out with the current Mizukage, and they’ve been undercover for two and a half years.”

“During the war?” Something struck Iruka. Team Seven had been split up for training two and a half years prior, and as far as he knew, Riko wasn’t returning anytime soon.

The Hokage wouldn’t…

“Yes, during. There are negotiations in the works, which you will be attending. Upon your return to Konoha after learning Korean you will be back to teaching, but you will no longer be a general curriculum teacher. Understood?”

“Understood, Hokage-sama.”  

“Umino, I wouldn’t have picked you for this if I didn’t think you could handle it.”

“Understood, Hokage-sama.”

* * *

Her team was going to _kill_ her. But what could she say? ”Oh yeah, I come from the village just an hour or so east that got razed to the ground, and I know almost everyone here because my family hid out here before they ran!”

Nope. Nope. She wasn’t going to get into it with them. She had enough of that sappy shit when that when Eun-Jin, the woman who had tapped her teacher on the shoulder, had pulled her aside and hugged her.

She was a ninja. She wasn’t supposed to be sappy.

But it was so hard when she could see the damage from that day around her. And even if they were rebuilding, she could still feel the blood on her clothes and in her hair. She could still hear her mother screaming for her as she felt people run over her towards the boats to the mainland as the former Mizukage’s forces tried their best to beat out any rebels and potential supporters, not caring if this village went down just like hers had.

She hadn’t been able to get up, too many feet colliding with her.

She was only alive because Eun-Jin had picked her up in the mess and tried to get her to a boat. But Eun-Jin was closing in on ninety. She may be strong, a former kunoichi long since retired that had kept in shape, but there was only so much speed she could get up in that moment with a twelve-year-old in her arms.

Her mother’s face had been tear-streaked, and it was seared into her memory since then.

Eun-Jin had taken care of her, helped her recover from her injuries.

She had been the one to take her to Terumi-Seonsaengnim. She had been the one to set her on her path.

And now she was the one trying to find the girl and get her to speak to her.

And Jae-Un couldn’t bring herself to face her. She couldn’t look at the woman without knowing what she lost. She had family, and she didn’t even know if they were alive or dead, or if they had found refuge somewhere.

She had nothing on them, and all she had as some sort of connection was this old woman that had picked up a near-trampled twelve-year-old and tried to help her.

“You can’t run forever, Kim-shi.”

“Byeon-shi.” Jae-Un adjusted the tools she was carrying. “How may I help you?”

“You can help me by joining me for tea, young lady. I didn’t let you go into shinobi work just to watch you ignore me when I saw you again.”

“Let me? You practically pushed me into it!”

“And it was this or watching you go down the same route as so many of the other young women left destitute and alone by the war.

“You have an opportunity here to gain power, not to be demeaned for your profession and at the mercy of your madame.”

“I wouldn’t have gone into-“

“You can’t say that now. You can’t speak for what you would have done in a different situation, because you haven’t lived the possibilities.”

“Byeon-shi…”

“You can be as much of an individual as you’d like. All I ask is a request for you to let me know if you need help. If you’re okay.”

“Byeon-shi.” Jae-Un inhaled, bracing herself. “If I am to grow, I can’t cling to my past.”

“Clinging to your past and accepting it as part of you are different things, Jae-Un. You may never find your family, but you have people here for you, and you have a team that enjoys you.

“I was a kunoichi once too, young lady. Kiri doesn’t teach this, but your team can be one of your most valuable assets, and your past can draw you together where there hasn’t been enough time for the bond to form.

“I only want to help you, Jae-Un. It is up to you to take my advice.”

Jae-Un glanced at the chord around her wrist. It had a small piece of wood tied at either end with her name carved gently and carefully into it, though the wood had been worn down so her name was faint enough to be barely visible.

It had been a gift from her older brother.

“Understood, Byeon-shi.”

* * *

Naruto looked between his teacher and the Hokage.

“What do you mean?! First you say Ri-chan isn’t coming back, then you say you’re sending Iruka-sensei away, and now you’re taking Kaka-sensei too?!”

“Naruto, Iruka will only be gone for a few months, and with luck Riko will be coming back soon. Kakashi will be gone for a few weeks, at most.

“If all goes well on this mission, then we will be back in two weeks and I’ll have more answers. But you can’t come in here and complain every time you get mad.”

Naruto frowned, crossing his arms. “I still don’t think it’s fair. How else are we supposed to learn cool stuff?”

“I will be providing you a temporary teacher. Now get out of my office!”

“But, Baa-chan!”

“But, Naruto!”

If Kakashi decided to watch the conversation devolve from there (and keep his protégé captive to watch as well), well those in the Jounin headquarters would understand, and they were the only people whose opinions mattered. After all, they were the ones he went drinking with.

“Maa, Sasuke-kun. You shouldn’t leave your teammate to fight their battles alone, not even in-village. Haven’t you learned this by now?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay I'm sick and dead tired, so this chapter isn't nearly as edited as normal, so please have mercy. This week is over, though, which means I have a weekend to get better and do all my homework before next week kicks my ass. 
> 
> Hope you all had a great week! Spring Break is soon, so I hope to get a lot more writing done then!


	7. Kages Have a Strange Sense of Humor

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tsunade and Mei meet in person. Iruka worries about a past student. And Kakashi might be worried, too. Who can tell?

 It wasn’t until they were on there way home that Ren realized it.

Nothing had gone terribly wrong. Things had gone fine, and towards the end, Jae-Un had even begun smiling and interacting more freely with her team. She had started joking and laughing again, eventually introducing Ren and the team to an elderly woman who insisted on teaching all of them some of the local recipes before feeding them on their last night in the village.

It was Soo-Jung, actually, who pointed it out. She had come back to Ren’s apartment after they had reported in.

“I don’t see the big deal, Sunbae. So what, your reputation was wrong.” She smirked. “It’s not like it was a good thing to be known for anyway, so you don’t have to freak out.”

“What’s she freaking out over now?” Suigetsu chucked a drink container that looked suspiciously like the cheap alcohol he got from questionable sources at Soo-Jung.

“She’s goin’ nuts because nothing went wrong on our mission.”

Suigestu froze before looking to Ren. “What does she mean?”

“Exactly what she said. _Nothing_ went wrong.”

“What the fuck, Deongsaeng! You can’t take those kids out on a mission if nothing went wrong this time. You’ll get them killed!”

“You think I don’t know that? Unlike you, I can’t escape my bad luck!”

Suigetsu scoffed. “You think I can escape it when I have to see you come back bleeding and dying, trudging into this apartment like you shouldn’t have gone straight to a hospital instead? You think that’s being able to escape it? You have shit luck, Deongsaeng, but we’ve all seen it in action.

“You’re going on a mission with me, whether you like it or not, so that when your shit luck hits the fan you’ve got someone around who won’t lose their goddamn mind.”

Soo-Jung scoffed. “Kiri shinobi don’t do that, Jong-Min-shi.”

Suigetsu laughed at that. “Nah, friend. They don’t. Not until they’re on a mission with her, anyway.” He sat on the ground, facing the two of them. “We had a mission once where she was just supposed to duck into a bar and get some information. Instead, she pissed off a major civilian crime syndicate in the area and we ended up having to do a lot more than just track down some asshole loyalists.”

Soo-Jung’s eyes lit up. “Oh, do tell. I love hearing stories about Choi-shi.”

“Hey! Since when did I get downgraded from ‘Sunbae’ to ‘Choi-shi’?”

“Since I found out you freak out when things _don’t_ go wrong, now shut up! I wanna hear the story!”

Soo-Jung was going to be the death of her. And what was worse? Suigetsu seemed to genuinely _like_ her, meaning he would probably drag her into anything he could that involved their team.

* * *

The Mizukage was a woman of many talents, the least of which was intimidating jumpy, newly-minted Jounin.

Nevertheless, when Iruka met the woman for the first of the negotiations he was struck by the fact that this woman had led a _civil war_ to completion in a major hidden village and then seamlessly taken command.

“Ah! Hokage-sama!” Mei looked to Iruka, laughing at how tense the young man was. “Oh, is this the shinobi you wanted to send? He’s adorable, Tsuande-san! Should you tell him who his allies are or should I?”

“Terumi-san,” Tsunade motioned for Iruka to sit. “It is a pleasure to see you, particularly under such pleasant circumstances.”

“Yes it is! Now, what’s your name, young man?”

Iruka looked between the two women, nervous. Both of them could kill him faster than he could blink and he wouldn’t even realize it had happened.

Sure, he and Anko had a joke when they were messing around that it was his thing. But now that he was faced with the terrifying prospect of two women who could absolutely kill him, he was fucking _terrified_.

“Young man?”

“AH! Sorry, ma’am.” Iruka bowed. “My name is Umino Iruka.”

“Rank?”

“Ch-Jounin, ma’am.”

“Chu-Jouin? Tsunade-san, you don’t have a new rank, do you?”

Tsunade smirked, glancing at Iruka. “I do not. I think this young man is a bit flustered.”

“Iruka-kun, you have nothing to fear! I wish I could introduce you to the young woman you’ll be working with, but she was away when I departed. 

“Again, Tsunade-san. Should I tell him about his allies, or should you?”

Tsunade sighed. “Go ahead, Terumi-san.”

“Well, then. Umino-kun, you will be working with Nara Riko, who is currently undercover as Akagi Ren, also known within Kiri by the name Choi Chae-Seon. The only people who know her identity are her senior teammates, myself, and my advisors. If you reveal her, you have a long list of people who are used to having her back that will be more than willing to help you… get lost.”

“Please don’t threaten my shinobi, Terumi-san.”

“I’m not threatening. Just warning.”

Tsunade smirked in response. Of all the Kages she had interacted with, Mei certainly had the most spark to her. If only all kages were as spunky, her job would be a lot more fun.

* * *

Soo-Jung had been put in charge of the genin team until Ren had gone on another mission. Apparently the people she worked with were significantly more superstitious than she was. Even if they had fought several high ranking missing-nin on their last mission and Chae-Seon’s cover had been partially blown, that wasn’t too bad. Apparently Suigetsu had already known about her being undercover, and Jeong-Hwa hadn’t heard anything or cared too much once Soo-Jung had ranted about it at their apartment. He had gone to the Mizukage, taken her word for it, and told her to calm down.

He was right, in that instance. He was almost always right, and it was infuriating.

And now he was saying that so many high-level shinobi being cautious about how easy Chae-Seon’s last mission had gone was something to be wary of herself.

“She did have a reputation during the war. People came back alive, but her missions always went horrifically wrong.”

“Yeah, but that was the war. We were literally just rebuilding.”

Jeong-Hwa shrugged. “I don’t know. I heard she went on a recon mission with a strict order not to engage, and despite precautions she ended up engaging the enemy in battle while protecting her wounded partner.”

“How do you know her partner wasn’t lying?”

“One of the Mizukage’s advisors has reason to lie in a report?”

Jeong-Hwa worked more regularly in the translation department, making sure all reports were available in two languages. He had access to all the reports since the Mei’s takeover of the government, and he was allowed to share any information from publicly available records. Seeing as Choi Chae-Seon was one of a team of popular shinobi figures for those in-village who _had_ supported the war, the reports by her or her teammates were usually edited and then released to the public.

It had been ingenious of Mei to introduce such a system, Soo-Jung had to admit. Keeping the people engaged in the shinobi world through a modified and controlled lens kept them from becoming alienated, and kept the shinobi appearing as people to those they served.

“You’re sure this is a genuine pattern?”

Jeong-Hwa nodded. “And if what little of her Konoha record I could find is believable, it’s been going on since long before she joined Kiri.”

* * *

“I swear to god, Jong-Min! I’m going to kill you if you keep up this disappearing and reappearing bullshit in the house!” Ren threw a kunai at Suigetsu. “You asshole! It’s too fucking early!”

“I don’t know, Deongsaeng. You’ve been put off mission duty and training duty until the Mizukage gets back to give you your new assignment. Apparently it’s a long-term overlap mission or something like that.

“If it’s something dangerous, we wouldn’t want you off your game for a second now, would we?”

“I’ll wipe that smarmy fucking look off your damn face.”

Haku trailed in, his hair a mess and his sleep clothes wrinkled. “If you two don’t stop it, I’ll leave you both to decompose in the swamp.”

“You’re coffee is getting made, you angry old man.” Ren poured herself the bitter sludge they called coffee before sliding some to Haku. “It’s just as coarse, dark, and sludgy as the mud from the Snakemoss Swamp. Just how we’ve been chugging it down for the last two years.”

Suigetsu looked down at his own mug. “Why don’t we ever get better coffee? Or, like, actually stop making our coffee like we’re teenagers who just threw it in water and hoped for the best?”

“Because we _are_ teenagers that have been throwing our coffee grounds into water and hoping for the best.” Ren glanced over her coffee mug as she spoke. “And we _could_ make our coffee better, but how much effort are we willing to put into it?”

Suigetsu shrugged. “I guess.”

A day full of training with just her team.

Yeah.

Ren was going to go nuts before the Mizukage got back.

* * *

Negotiations were going a lot better than Tsunade had hoped. Evidently, having Riko for longer than they had originally agreed upon was a great advantage for getting her people into Kiri.

“Hokage-sama.” Iruka was standing at the entrance of the small room, clearly uncomfortable. “Um…”

“You want to talk about Riko, don’t you?”

He looked down, almost shameful. “If it’s classified I understand. It’s just…

“When I run the unit on foreign shinobi, I pull out the bingo book and find some of the more… more advanced opponents that are out there. I do it to make a point to the kids not to get cocky, that there are people not that much older than them that are powerful enough that some fresh out of the Academy Genin register to them as small fry.

“And ever since she appeared in the Bingo Book, I’ve used Akagi Ren. She’s fifteen, so she’s not that much older than them. It makes the girls aware that they can have a life outside of being a wife or a fangirl. That being powerful is possible, even if our village is significantly more conservative during peace times.

“Not only that, she was a dominating force on the battlefield. She wasn’t to be approached without at least two jounin as back-up.

“And not once did I think that was one of my students. I know shinobi are killers. We all have blood on our hands. But Riko… I remember her Academy days, and I can’t help but wonder what this kind of mission has done to her emotionally. I would never question your judgement, Hokage-sama. I just… I just…”

“You’re worried.”

Iruka nodded.

“She was your student, Umino. It’s understandable. I’m sure I could have done things differently, but at the time we didn’t have many options. We were just coming out of Orochimaru’s invasion and we needed to have those three out and away from Konoha as soon as possible for their own protection. Sending her to be trained in a country of water-users seemed like the best idea at the time.

“We were naïve to think Terumi wouldn’t utilize every resource at her disposal. Especially when one of those resources was a pretested Chuunin who had a decent skill for strategy and improvisation.

“I want you to know, going into Kiri, that her file shows she has not only adapted to her undercover role, but seems to have adopted it. She is likely going to seem as loyal to Kiri as she was to Konoha. I honestly am not even sure of her loyalties at this point, and the longer she’s there I have to wonder if she’s gone completely into Kiri.

“You’re there to learn the language, but you’re also there as my agent on the inside. Keep an eye on her, make sure she’s not… she’s not…”

“Compromised.”

Now it was Tsunade’s turn to nod, however reluctantly.

“And if she is?”

Tsunade looked to the window of her room. “If she’s compromised leave her. She didn’t know much about our system anyway, as far as I can tell. She was a clan child, and that will be a political hurdle, but we might be able to resolve the issue.”

“What would you tell her family?”

“Shikaku would have a cow. Yoshino might just go the political assassination route.”

Iruka shook his head, huffing a small laugh. “I wouldn’t say they’d go that far.”

Tsunade shrugged. “If she’s compromised, you let me handle it. That’s an order, understood?”

Iruka hesitated, before accepting the order and bowing. “Yes, Hokage-sama.”

“Umino, don’t mistake these orders to be that you have to keep her at arms’ length. She was your student, and she has her own students now. I’m sure she’ll be happy to see you again, though she may only address it in private.

“She’s a colleague now, as much as she was your student. You’re allowed to befriend her. We are trying to form an alliance, after all.”

Iruka smiled. “Yes, Hokage-sama.”

“That’s all, Iruka-kun. You’re dismissed.”

The young man kept smiling as he bowed and left the room. She had to hope that Riko wasn’t compromised. But if she was, then there had to be a way to resolve it without the immediate solution of organizing her death. She wasn’t going to do that to Shikaku and his wife just as they were getting news and whispers about their daughter.

Kakashi walked in as Iruka left. “Maa, Hokage-sama.” A bow. He was being polite, meaning he was about to be a pain in her ass.

“What do you want, Hatake?”

* * *

“Okay, Chae-Seon.” Suigetsu was oddly eager, especially for how early in the day it was. The bars in the village refused to open before dark. “It’s time.”

“That’s ominous. Care to explain?” Ren start flicking a senbon around, weaving it through her fingers as they spoke. She really needed to take a mission or start working with her students again. Haku refused to let the team train more than half the day, claiming they “needed rest”. The one time she and Suigetsu had snuck out early to train, Haku had pinned them to the wall with his senbon and refused to let them down until the afternoon came around.

“You’ve finally got lightning chakra down, so I think you can handle this.” Suigetsu reached for a sealing scroll he had been carrying around for the last few days.

“You’re finally going to explain your sadism? Thanks, but Icha Icha is saucy enough for me.”

“No, you weirdo.” Suigetsu’s head cocked. “Wait you read that? You’re younger than me, and I had to wait till I got away from any of the higher-ups long enough to get to a bookstore to get my hands on a copy, and they still wouldn’t sell it to me!”

“My sensei didn’t exactly have a strong grasp on the definition of ‘age appropriate literature’.”

“Your sensei? As in your _genin team sensei?_ ” Ren nodded. Still flicking the senbon around aimlessly. She was enjoying this conversation. “What kind of freak was your sensei?!”

Ren shrugged. “Hatake Kakashi. Pretty great teacher if you get around the inability to show up on time, the constant crypticness, and that smug eye-grin he does when he’s right.”

Suigetsu swears under his breath before unfurling the scroll. “Well forgetting your _weirdly awesome_ genin-team sensei from your hometown, which we _will_ be talking about later, I have a very different reason for making you learn lightning chakra.

“I wasn’t just watching you suffer. Though, that was kind of funny. You’re pretty damn creative with your profanity. I wanted you to learn lightning chakra, because there have been some discussions with the Mizukage, and she wanted you to be able to wield _these_.”

Suigetsu pulled the Kiba swords out of the scroll, tossing them to Ren. “These are the Kiba swords, as I’m sure you’re aware. Seonsaengnim wanted you to be able to use them. She thinks you’ll be pretty kickass.”

Ren’s eyes were wide, taking in the lethal yet beautiful blades. The thorn like pieces sticking out of the blade caught the light, and she found herself smiling. “Oppa… these are fucking brilliant.”

Suigetsu smirked. “I thought you’d say that. Now, it’s time for you to test those sharp fuckers out. Get ready, Deongsaeng. I’m not going easy on you.”

And suddenly one of her best friends was coming at her with his own blade and she found herself fighting in one of the most interesting spars of her life.

* * *

The letter that was slipped to Mei by her guard lifted her spirits a bit as she went into the negotiations. The Kiba swords were now in Ren’s hands, and she was learning them with at least some ease.

The negotiations were going well, but she wasn’t sure what she thought of the jounin that was coming into her territory. He hadn’t said much, and her intelligence said he had been an Academy teacher before the sudden promotion and movement to come to Kiri.

Holding the letter – written in Korean, though she would likely translate it and send it back with the Hokage. Best not to hide anything now that she would have two Konoha shinobi running around her village – she walked down the hall. She was meeting with just Iruka, a simple lunch with him and Hatake Kakashi. She and Iruka would have a chance to ask questions, and Hatake was there as insurance for Tsunade that she wouldn’t harm or threaten her shinobi in any way.

Mei may not have known much about Riko when she came into her forces, either, but she couldn’t afford to be picky during the war. She had also been grateful for any slight show of support from the Konoha shinobi. She was happy to have a non-verbal assurance of alliance if she succeeded.

And once Riko had shaped up into a formidable shinobi, she had been glad the young woman was on her side.

She wasn’t in a war now, however. She could make a point of getting to know the young man she was bringing back with her. She could needle him privately with some questions between sessions with the Hokage.

Iruka was standing at one end of the room they were to eat in. He was somewhat uncomfortable, if his ramrod straight posture was anything to go by.

“Ah, Umino-san. I’m glad you could make it.”

“Uh, my pleasure, Mizukage-sama.”

“Please, Mei.” Mei motioned for him to sit. “I just want to talk. Nothing important. I just want to know who it is I’m bringing into my forces. I’m sure you understand.”

Iruka nodded, still uncomfortably stiff as he sat in his seat. “Absolutely, Mizukag-“ he faltered at her look. “Ah, Mei-sama.”

Well, it was progress. “I’m sure you’ll see, once we get to Kiri, that the war has made things significantly less formal, particularly with my shinobi and myself. I would hope for you to follow their example.”

“Understood, Mei-sama.”

“Now, do you have any questions about Kirigakure?”

The younger man faltered. Undoubtedly he wanted to ask about Riko. Zabuza had relayed that Umino had been one of Riko’s Academy teachers.

“I was wondering, how exactly will I be expected to learn this language?” 

“You will be living with Choi Chae-Seon and her team, and they tend to speak the language amongst themselves. This will, hopefully, build any language skills you develop during your lessons.

“As for your day lessons, your mornings will be spent with Kim Jeong-Hwa. He is in our translation department, and the cousin of one of Chae-Seon-shi’s friends. You will likely run into her at some point, so I warn you now – Soo-Jung is an abrasive young woman, but she has taken a shine to Chae-Seon and her team. You’ll likely see her around, and she likely won’t spare you from her loud insults and constant desire to pick a fight. Be mindful that she is one of a number of very skilled jounin in our village.”

“Yes ma’am. And what of my afternoons?”

“You’ll be training with Chae-Seon and her team. Battlefield vocabulary won’t be as stressed in your lessons, as you have to be able to communicate with the civilians and the shinobi. As such, you’ll get your professional vocabulary with her team. The hope is that you’ll also gain some skills working with them.

“My advice would be to let Chae-Seon and Jong-Min, also known outside Kiri by Hoozuki Suigetsu, fight each other. They’ll be your more dangerous opponents, and they like to fight each other, meaning they won’t be focused on you. Haku and Chojuro are more likely to try and work with you as training partners, and not just sparring partners.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Now, any other questions?”

The man swallowed whatever his next question was down as Hatake Kakashi came in, sitting in a vacant seat. “I’m sorry I’m late, Mizukage-sama.”

“I appreciate you joining us, Hatake-san.”

“Maa, it’s no trouble!”

The man certainly lived up to his reputation for being blasé and late. Granted, most of that reputation came to Mei’s attention when she had a rare moment during the war to go drinking with some of her soldiers, and she and Riko had ended up talking about their experiences being from different villages.

“Mizukage-sama,” well, any progress with Iruka had just been erased by Hatake’s arrival, “I take it you have questions for me?”

“Very astute, young man. I do. Let’s get started.”

* * *

The negotiations couldn’t all go well. She had just hoped it wouldn’t be _this_ issue.

“I want Hatake to escort Umino to your village.”

“And I’ve told you, we can’t have a foreign-nin roaming through our country unescorted.”

“What if you sent an escort?”

“What?”

“A two-man escort. You send two jounin as an escort for Hatake, either until the border or through to the village.”

“A two-man escort?” Mei considered the option. “And do you have any other… specifications for this team?”

“I want us to see Akagi Ren. I want her in Konoha’s borders.”

“You want to make sure she’s still loyal to Konoha, don’t you?” Tsunade raised an eyebrow.

“And if I do?”

“She’s not going to break cover for a second. Not unless she’s got a guarantee that she’s going to be safe.”

“What do you mean safe?” Tsunade huffed. “The second she comes back her identity would be concealed.”

“The second she comes back?”

“Mei, she may have a Genin team, but she’s _my shinobi_. She should come back to Konoha. Her team has returned, all we need is for her to come back.”

Mei glanced at her. “I’ll send her back as an escort with Hatake. She can stay no more than five days, and then she must be on her way back.

“She’s your shinobi, but she fought my war. She is a huge force for PR in our village. I’m sure you understand, Tsunade-san, the effects a few pretty faces can have on a crowd?

“We need all the good publicity we can get, Tsunade. We need to hold onto loyalty within the village to develop loyalty in our country. We need her.”

Tsunade didn’t like the arrangement. She didn’t like it at all. But she would take what she could get. “And what do we tell the people who will recognize her chakra signature? To the people who already know of her assignment?”

“You have people who know of the assignment too? What is this, the worst kept secret in the Shinobi world?”

“What do you mean ‘too’?”

Mei sighed. “I mean her primary teammates may have found out through extenuating circumstances during the war about her undercover assignment.”

Tsunade sighed. “Why can’t things go right for once? What is wrong with her?”

Zabuza, who had been rather silent up until this point, barked a laugh. “Nice to know her luck’s always been shit.”

Kakashi raised an eyebrow. “How so?”

“That girl was known for bad luck when she first came to Kiri. All her missions go to shit, it’s hilarious.”

Mei nudged him. “Actually her last one didn’t go wrong. At all.”

Zabuza blanched. “What?”

* * *

Ren would be lying if she said everything was going fine, but she had to admit, what she and Suigetsu had just pulled off was fucking _amazing_. Yeah, she needed to be more careful about how she used lightning chakra, and yes, her form was way off with the Kiba swords.

But they had just won the fight by basically making an explosion. Why hadn’t anyone thought of doing this before? Having a water-based attack followed up by a lighting-based attack was awesome.

“You two are never to do that in training again. Am I clear?”

The lecture from Ao after destroying a large section of field and someone’s fence? Not so much.

“Then how are we supposed to make it work better for the battlefield?”

Ao raised an eye, looking at Suigetsu. “Oh, trust me. You won’t need to make _that_ work better for the battlefield. I’m pretty sure if you used it in a fight it would do too much damage for anyone to care.”

Ren smirked. “Yeah, but what if we made it look cooler?”

Fancy jutsu have always been a weakness for shinobi, after all.

“Do we even have enough lightning users to make that worthwhile?” Ao glanced out the window. “I’m pretty sure you’re the only one we’ve got stupid enough to try it, and we had to train you into it. Not too many shinobi are _that_ masochistic.”

“I’m not a masochist, asshole.”

“The scars on your arms beg to differ.”

Suigetsu laughed. “Anyway, back to what you were telling us?”

“The Mizukage is bringing a representative from Konoha to learn Korean. He has an escort with him, and you’ll be taking the escort back to Konoha.”

“Okay, Ao, I know you hate me-“

“I don’t hate you.”

“But you have to admit, sending me back to Konoha _while I’m undercover_ is one of the stupidest ideas ever. Are you trying to get me court martialed?”

“Does Konoha do court martials?”

“I don’t know! I just know traitors get executed, which if I’m asked questions I can’t answer while I’m undercover, could be how I go out.”

“That would be the ultimate way for a mission to go wrong. I’m with Ren. She isn’t going out unless it’s in a hilarious battlefield mishap. You sure about this, Ao?”

“The Hokage insisted on Akagi Ren, and the Mizukage had to agree. If this language thing goes well, we have a strong basis for an alliance. We could even send a war-team or two out to learn Japanese. A lot of our Genin from the islands don’t know it, and it’s going to impact their career, especially once they hit Chuunin.

“We have to be thinking five steps ahead, Chae-Seon. We can’t waste an opportunity for an alliance with a major power like Konoha. On the international stage, that gives our regime legitimacy – major powers will take us more seriously if one of their own thinks we can hold onto power.

“It also gives us power if we’re up against the Daimyo. Allying Konoha and Kirigakure means our countries will have to work more closely together, or they risk pitting allies against each other, which never works out well for a daimyo. I’m sure at this point you’ve read up on what happened with the second Mizukage and the Daimyo, right?”

“Yeah, yeah. After the assault on Iwa during the second Mizukage’s reign, the Daimyo tried to get Se-Jong Seonsaengnim to attack Kumo, our ally at the time. Because of the assault, Kumo assassinated our Daimyo, allowing the Land of Lightning to insert a temporary puppet government.”

“And how did that end for us?”

“It ended with Yagura taking power after assassinating _that_ Daimyo, leading to a power vacuum that wasn’t filled until just before the revolution.”

“And why did the power vacuum take so long to fill?”

“Because shinobi villages are tools of the daimyo, and by law we are not allowed to insert our own daimyo. It’s a conflict of interest. Instead we let powerful families in the capital duke it out until they found someone they agree on.

“Look, Ao, I know all this. But that doesn’t change the fact that it’s dangerous to send me to begin with, whether it’s agreed upon or not!”

“The Hokage has agreed to the terms that you are only there for five days, and then you come back. You having a Genin team gave us some negotiating leeway. Building on that, the Hokage recognizes the need for good PR, especially after a major conflict.

“You’ll be taking Suigetsu with you. You are allowed to expose your undercover identity within the walls of Konoha, but only to shinobi. You have five days to reunite with your former team, to visit your family, and to find any resources you may desire for training your Genin.

“The economy is strong right now in Konoha, so you would do best to find some weapons or materials for your Genin while you’re there. They can afford a better selection. Mei is working out a minor allowance for you to use for your team.

“These are the parameters of the escort mission. Beyond that, anything that goes to shit is your responsibility. Am I understood?”

“You’re perfectly understood.”

“Great. Now get the hell out of here. You’ve caused enough damage for one day.”


	8. We've Got This. Right?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ren isn't one or the other; Riko or Ren. She's something in between, and she thinks she's fine with. It doesn't mean she's not angry at her father, but that can wait for when shit isn't hitting the fan. 
> 
> Meanwhile, Iruka begins to settle in for life in Kirigakure, and someone begins to wonder at Soo-Jung's hatred of teaching.

The spinning and circular motions that Ren had to learn as part of using the Kiba swords was not only difficult, it felt slightly unnatural. For so long, her mantra had been to face her opponent. Now, she had to train herself into calculated risks for a huge payout in combat.

Well, there was something to be said for having friends/teammates more than willing to make her learn it through experience.

Haku was working a shift at the hospital, and Chojuro had recently been placed as a Japanese teacher with the reopening of the Academy, so Suigetsu had roped Soo-Jung into helping with their training that day. While Ren trained her Genin in the morning, Soo-Jung took the training a step further, roping Jeong-Hwa into their little group, making it a three-on-one battle, making her have to learn the fast turns and spins that had made the Kiba swords so deadly in the past.

Given her propensity for swords, and now that she had three that she was willing to use regularly in battle, she had finally gotten the seal on her wrist repaired. The skin was torn up enough that the ink couldn’t take the shape properly, though, so she had gone to a shinobi tattoo specialist. The man had tattooed seals over scars before, and had a system that kept the items stored in a separate part while having a warped-looking seal applied to the wrist so whatever weapon it was sealing would exit the seal where it needed to be – namely, in the hands of the shinobi who wielded it.

* * *

Kakashi was intrigued to see the Land of Water. He hadn’t been, except for a few after-dark missions that hadn’t let him see the people or the places. Despite being a shinobi, he couldn’t help the slight desire to travel. He had enjoyed the time he spent with Sasuke going around the Elemental Nations, and he found that he wished he had done it more.

If he weren’t such a well-known shinobi, maybe he could have.

They entered the village at night, and Kakashi was struck by how worn everything was, and how people acted out their normal lives despite that. It reminded him of the last Great Shinobi War, and how life had been in Konoha.

He had never wanted his students to see that. He might have been preparing them for that worst case, but he had held out hope.

The Mizukage led them to a large apartment building, gesturing to the door. Zabuza scowled. “So you’re throwing them to the wolves without even a warning, are you?”

“Of course. I find that’s the best way to learn.”

Of course, it wasn’t until a familiar chakra signature on a very unfamiliar face walked up that Kakashi felt a slight sense of foreboding.

* * *

Ren saw them first, which is what led her to conduct damage control. Before Suigetsu could say a damn thing, she whipped around and sucker-punched him, pissing him off enough that he yelled while she let their guests in.

“What the hell, Deongsaeng!?”

He was yelling in Korean. Even better. That meant Kakashi and Iruka would have no idea what was being said.

“You couldn’t make a scene with the foreign nin on the fucking street, oppa.”

“What?”

That’s when he noticed Kakashi and Iruka.

And that’s when he started asking for embarrassing stories from her childhood.

* * *

Iruka and Kakashi had been put into the same room for the night, but until they went to sleep they were in a living space, sharing stories with Riko and her team. While she had changed, Iruka could see that spark of wit and intelligence that made her undeniably Riko. She didn’t have that shining new-genin look she had when she first become a shinobi, but he had seen that steadily leaving her face since the mission in Wave.

Over two years in Kiri had just sped it up.

Suigetsu finished talking about some strange combination attack the two had done the day before, Kakashi coming in with a question.

“So, Riko-chan-“

“Chae-Seon or Ren, Sensei. At least in Kiri.”

“Chae-Seon, then.” Definitely the name Iruka had heard used more by the people in the room with them, and clearly one she preferred. “Why have you been learning lightning manipulation?”

“Because this asshole is vague and doesn’t explain anything.” She gestured at Suigetsu as she stood up, pulling a bottle from the fridge, pouring something that smelled to Kakashi like alcohol.

“I wasn’t allowed to say jack until you got the Kiba, Deongsaeng.”

“Doesn’t mean you couldn’t have.”

“That’s exactly what it means. I was ordered not to.”

“And when has that stopped you from doing anything?”

“Since Seonsaengnim said it. I don’t give a shit about Ao or Zabuza, but I am thoroughly convinced our dear Kage could rip every single one of us to shreds without really thinking about it.”

“She could not. She likes us too much.”

"No, she likes  _you_ too much. And that wouldn't stop her." 

Kakashi accepted the glass that was handed to him, confirming that yes, it was alcohol. A glance and a sip told him it was definitely not sake. First, it wasn’t as smooth as sake. Second, this alcohol was a lot stronger.

“What is this?”

“Soju. It’s made on some of the warmer islands, and it’s cheaper than getting Sake, since that stuff has tariffs on it. Better too, if you ask me.” Riko passed the bottle to Suigetsu, and Kakashi watched as her refilled his glass.

“Really? And how long have you been drinking, Chae-Seon?”

“For a while. It’s nice when you’re hanging out with friends like Soo-Jung or Jong-Min. It makes them more palatable." She took a punch to the arm from Suigetsu for that one, which she shrugged off. “Be careful if it’s your first time. This stuff is a lot stronger than sake, and we have to leave early tomorrow.”

Suigetsu glanced over at Kakashi, throwing himself back into the conversation. “Yeah. First time she had soju was hilarious. She got super drunk, super fast, and the next day was so hungover.

“It was even funnier because she’s so short, so some guy in the base made a joke about giving kids liquor, and she was so uncoordinated when she went after him she tripped and passed out on the floor.”

“We don’t need to relive my low moments, thanks.”

“Actually, Chae-Seon, I think we do.” Kakashi smiled, knowing it would irk his student.

And if he was excited to learn more about the type of shinobi his student had become? Well, who could blame him? 

* * *

Iruka woke up the next day to significantly less chaos than had been present before he went to sleep. The only chaos he could find around him was the scent of what might have been coffee being made. It took him a moment to smell it through the smell of burning and something that smelled so far from palatable, a weaker shinobi might have vomited.

“What’s going on?”

Haku, the lovely looking young man who had come in late and joined the conversation, was leaning on a table by a coffee maker while a congealed looking mess ran through the coffee maker.

“I am making coffee. Would you like some?”

“It smells like you charred some bricks.”

“Well if you can make it so much better, you do it.” Someone was a bit touchy in the morning. Good to know. 

Taking the invitation seriously, Iruka moved towards the coffee maker. Turning it off and switching out the grounds and water he had to fight the urge to scowl. The grounds were old, and they were also burnt.

“Did you cook these?”

“Jong-Min insists that’s why they’re called ‘roasts’.” Haku’s eyes were dropping shut as he spoke.

“Jong-Min?”

“Suigetsu.”

“Oh. Well, no. That’s not why. Where would he even get that idea?”

“We didn’t exactly get taught how to make coffee during the war.”

Iruka sighed. He raised a good point.

“Give me a few minutes.”

* * *

Riko and Suigetsu were an interesting combination. Clearly they were close, but from what Kakashi saw much of that closeness came from needling each other and picking small fights. It drew them together as they embarrassed each other, whether there was an audience or not.

It was funny to watch. There was nothing that spoke of anything beyond a friendly competition between the two of them, nothing to suggest they were actually trying to hurt each other.

Of course, they threw around a lot of specific vocabulary, things that either sounded like places within the Land of Water or like Korean words and phrases they didn't bother translating, that while he understood most of the conversation, there were parts (and sections, not that he would admit it) that he didn't follow.

They were taking a slightly longer route to Konoha in an effort to throw off any possible tracking. At least, that’s what Suigetsu had said.

“Just admit it, you’re trying to make something go wrong so we don’t have to deal with it if it doesn’t.”

“What? Why would I do that?”

Riko rolled her eyes. Though the longer he had to call her Ren or Chae-Seon the more it seemed to fit the changed woman in front of him. “Because we all know the longer things go fine the worse it’ll be when things go to shit.”

“Well you said it, not me.”

“Don’t even lie. You’ve been thinking it since Soo-Jung said our last mission went completely fine.”

Suigetsu stuck his tongue out.

“Maa, children. Perhaps we should be more mature?”

“Like you have any room to talk, Hatake.” Chae-Seon smirked at him.

“Yeah. And we could probably kick your ass if we wanted to.”

Kakashi glanced at Suigetsu. Jong-Min. Either way, he was going to put this snarky bastard in his place. “Would you like to prove it?” And yeah. Maybe they were goading him, but he could justify it as fostering friendly inter-village rivalries if anyone (Tsunade) asked. Probably. 

“Sure!” Suigetsu’s grin was mildly disturbing, as most from Kiri were with the sharpened teeth. Even Riko’s teeth seemed to have sharpened while she was there. “I’ll take that action. Once we get to Konoha, we’re duking it out!”

Riko rolled her eyes. “How do I get myself in these situations?” Riko's following sigh was the most theatrical nonsense he had ever seen from her, and it almost made him laugh. "Yeah. I'll get in on this fight." 

“Maa, Ren-san. How long have you been in Kiri?”

“Like two and a half years or so?”

“Three soon, right? Didn’t you show up like right as winter was really getting started?”

“Yeah, that’s right. Kiri winters suck ass.”

“You don’t have to tell me.”

He was going to be driven up a wall by these two, he swore. He couldn’t find a way to get Riko to ‘relate’ to him. At all. She acted like she really hadn't met him.

Well. At least he knew she could keep a cover if she ever had to disappear again.  

* * *

Iruka’s first impression of Kiri was worn down. Where Konoha shinobi would trade in badly torn flak jackets to either be repaired or replaced, a lot of the Kiri shinobi wore them as they were, even with the brutal marks of a self-made repair.

Kim Jeong-Hwa wore a flak jacket that bore the tell-tale marks of kunai having been imbedded within it. There were even some spots where the blood hadn’t come out, and Iruka could still see flecks.

Jeong-Hwa himself wasn’t particularly tall or remarkable. He had dark hair, kept short and somewhat messy. His eyes were a standard brown, his skin a standard, medium shade for the region; he wasn't particularly tanned or pale.

He was, essentially, the epitome of the shinobi. Completely unremarkable to the point of being able to go undetected and unsuspected until he was already long gone from the scene of whatever mission he had just completed.

“Do you understand, Umino-shi?”

He had insisted on using Korean forms of address, even when using Japanese, to assert the language and some of the smaller aspects of it.

“Ne, seonsaengnim.”

Knowing what that word meant made it strange to hear people talking about the Mizukage. To be called teacher so casually by one’s own soldiers implied a level of respect and camaraderie he hadn’t thought of within the context of a leader and their subordinates. Even though the Third had been called the Professor, it was never in person or by his people. Always, it was within the context of his prowess as a shinobi. When he had asked Jeong-Hwa about it, he had explained the title had been passed along with leaders as the first Mizukage had been revered first as a teacher. He had only taken the mantle of the leader of a Hidden Village because those he had taught and those he had served with during the formation of the Land of Water as a nation, and the formation of Kirigakure as its military village, saw his teaching skills as an asset when it came to leadership. The title had been passed down since then, and it became a standard. A Kage in Kirigakure had to be respected as a leader, a fighter, and a teacher. 

Iruka thought it also spoke to the character of some of those who had taken the hat of the Mizukage, that (excluding Yagura, though no one was really willing to talk about how he had taken power) they were connected to their shinobi in such a way. 

“Now, you will be joining me for the latter part of this morning as I visit my cousin. She is currently maintaining Chae-Seon-shi’s Genin team while she is away.”

He had met Kim Soo-Jung when she had stormed into the apartment that morning, just as the coffee finished, demanding to see Chae-Seon only to realize she wasn’t there, and the person she spent a solid three minutes ranting (that's what Haku had called it, anyway) was foreign and didn't understand a word she had said. That had lead to some interesting insults and gesturing at Iruka. 

She had been rather irate, and her calm lasted only a moment before she was given her new assignment. After that, she scowled, talking about why she hated the idea of being ‘stuck teaching again'.  "I'm not cut out for teaching, can't Seonsaengnim see that?" she had said, chugging a mug of coffee like it wasn't still scalding hot. 

Something told Iruka she could have been a great teacher. She seemed to have the energy for it, anyway, and as long as she didn't swear too much (some of those insults were creative, but he didn't plan to repeat them anytime soon), she would probably get on well with kids. 

* * *

Ji-Su may not have liked him, but Jae-Un loved the strange man from Konoha.

He had offered (according to Jeong-Hwa) to teach them Japanese. It was just what she needed to further her career. Every little bit that helped her toward Chuunin was a step in the right direction.

“What’d you say your name was again?”

The man puzzled through the question before Jae-Un tried to use her limited knowledge of Japanese from growing up with a bit of it in her local dialect. It helped being one of the first ports into Kiri, sometimes.

_“What… name?”_

She was pretty sure she had botched that. Horribly.

But she did well enough that his face brightened. “Iruka. I’m Iruka.”

“Nice to meet you!”

He knew that phrase.

* * *

It wasn’t until Chae-Seon was gone (she had gone down to a river to gather some water in a canteen that Kakashi was pretty sure she wouldn’t actually need) that Suigetsu rounded on him.

“I hear you have Icha Icha.”

“What?”

He scowled. “Chae-Seon told me about it. She read them when she was twelve, apparently, which _rude_ , but she also said you had them.”

“I may have lent them out once several years ago.”

“What do I have to do to get to peek at them?”

“How do you know her real name?”

“We met when she got me out of Orochimaru’s lab, handed me a sword and threw me a coat, and said to get slashing. Nicest thing anyone's ever said to me, come to think of it. Some of the assholes there recognized her.

“Now will you let me read the damn book?”

“I’ll think about it.”

* * *

Chae-Seon found out about the interaction within minutes of returning. If you asked Kakashi, she knew it was going to happen, so when she came back it was just a ruse to give her deniability.

“He’s just going to pester you.”

“I want to know more about how he knows your little secret. I thought the whole point of wearing a disguise was making sure no one knew who you were.”

“I’ll tell you in Konoha.”

“It wouldn’t have to do with all of your missions going wrong, would it?”

“Absolutely does.

“Ri- Chae-Seon. You can talk to me, you know that?”

The glance she threw around told Kakashi she probably didn’t trust anything in the open. “I know that. Sensei.”

Kakashi nodded. Riko was being cagey, but there was no reason he could see that she would be compromised. He didn’t see what Tsunade was worried about. For all of his students, it hadn’t been the village that made them loyal. It was the people. And Riko most of all had been tied to the bonds she had with her friends and family. As long as she had those bonds, she would come out of this just fine. Maybe she would still be Chae-Seon, but she wouldn’t just leave Konoha.

It wasn’t her style.

* * *

“That man doesn’t belong here.”

“Ji-su!”

“I’m not kidding, Jae-Un. He’s a foreigner. How do we know we can trust him?”

“Because Seonsaengnim let him in! She wouldn’t bring anyone into Kiri she didn’t trust. And she wouldn’t let Jeong-Hwa bring him near us without our regular teacher if she really thought it was dangerous.”

“She would if she was fooled by him.

“He’s a jounin, and he’s soft. It’s got to be an act!”

Soo-Jung scowled. “It’s not an act, you morons. Yeah, he’s probably here for some information, but he’s a shinobi. Seonsaenngnim knew that when she brought him in.

“Besides. He’s a teacher, that’s what he does. Of course, he’s soft. It’s peaceful in Konoha and he just teaches kids how to be pre-Genin by our standards. Give it ten years or so and we’ll have soft shinobi, too. That’s just what peace does.”

“I still don’t like him.”

“Well you don’t have to like him, Ji-Su. He’s here to stay for at least a few months.”

The girl eyed Iruka as he spoke to Jeong-Hwa, who refused to use Japanese more than necessary. They had laughed when he had tried to help Soo-Jung. She would give the man an order, repeating it with gestures until he understood. It was kind of funny to watch, in Mi-Na’s opinion.

“I like Iruka-shi. He’s funny.”

“How so?” Ji-Su watched her teammate carefully.

“He’s trying so hard, but I don’t think he even realizes that he’s learned a lot today alone just from listening to people. He’s constantly looking for a grade.

“It’s funny. He’s a teacher who wants to get a good grade.”

The irony was pretty funny, Ji-Su couldn’t argue with that.

* * *

Oh yeah. Something was up. The universe was getting cosmic justice for whatever wrongs she had committed in a past life.

They were halfway through the Land of Fire and nothing had gone wrong.

Nothing.

“Your plan failed, Oppa.”

“Yeah, you don’t think I see that?”

Kakashi blinked. “We still have quite a ways to go before Konoha. Even at shinobi pace, there is a chance that something could still go wrong. Not that I can understand why you would want it to…”

“Stay out of it, Hatake.” Ren flicked a senbon at her teammate, landing it in his side. Kakashi raised an eyebrow. 

“What the hell, Chae-Seon?”

Ren shrugged.

“What can I say, you make yourself an easy target.”

They couldn’t get to Konoha fast enough.

* * *

“Hokage-sama, my youngest daughter is on that team My _nephew_ is the team leader. A child of the Nara clan is on that team.

“You must send someone after that team.”

“And I’m assuming you expect to be on that team, am I right, Hiashi?”

Hiashi nodded. “Naturally. She is _my_ daughter.”

“And she’s Hinata’s sister. And Hinata’s team is a tracking specialist team, are they not?”

“Hokage-sama, you can’t be serious!”

“I am completely serious. You are a clan head. We can’t risk you.

“Not to mention, I have to worry, based on past events, that there will be pressures to disregard our jounin for the genin on the team. They are both Hyugga, but if such pressures were to exist, there is one Hyuuga whose eyes will be destroyed should he be killed. Not to mention two non-Hyuuga team members.”

“Hokage-sama, I would never put my nephew in jeopardy.”

Tsunade met Hiashi’s eyes. “You can promise me if it comes to it, you will do everything, and I mean absolutely _everything_ , in your power to save all four of those kids?”

“Hokage-sama, the Hyuuga are a loyal clan. I will gladly do the best I can to return all four members of this team to the village.”

Tsunade looked toward Hiashi. There was so much wrong when she considered this.

“You haven’t been active in the field in years, Hiashi. If you go on this mission I will be forced to send you with a partner who you will be your commanding officer throughout the mission.”

“Hokage-sama, surely…”

“Hiashi, I couldn’t get this mission approved on a good day. Sending a clan dead who has been off the active duty roster for years into the territory of confirmed hostiles to retrieve three genin and a chuunin? Even with the clan affiliations involved, you have to take someone with you. If only to maintain some semblance of objectivity.”

“Who are you sending me out with?”

“I was thinking Nara Shikaku.”

“Isn’t he just as attached to this as I am? He has a niece on that team, does he not?”

“He’s also our jounin commander. That should pull enough weight when I have to justify this to the council tomorrow, after you two are _long gone,_ I would hope, that this doesn’t completely blow up in my face. You better come back from this fine, or I will hunt down your corpse and kill your ghost. 

“Now if you could go and get Shikaku from his office for me, I’ll begin the mission write up.”

* * *

“I’m kicking your ass when we get to Konoha, Oppa. That was a cruel joke to play.”

She was soaking, Suigetsu having shoved her into a river as they passed along its banks, and it was almost winter. Even though Fire Country was a lot warmer than the Land of Water, and even with her water affinity being useful when it came to drying herself off, she was still chilled. She was going to be freezing for hours.

“So?”

“Wipe that smarmy fucking grin off your face before I-“

But before she can finish that threat an all too familiar face is running towards her.

“Riko-sensei!”

There’s blood streaming down her forehead, and Ren has to wonder if that’s what’s letting her put two and two together to make five. She doesn’t look like she did when she was Riko, and there is no way Aimi had chakra sensing sensitive enough at that age to be able to tell it was her now.

Not to mention she shouldn’t even be out of the Academy. Isn’t she too young?

And goddammit, this is exactly the kind of thing she wanted to avoid – someone dying – and now, if she wasn’t careful, it was going to be Fumio’s little sister.

“Deongsaeng?”

“I’ve got something to take care of Suigetsu. No matter what I do, you stick with Kakashi.”

She knew shit had to hit the fan at some point.

* * *

Shikaku and Hiashi had left within an hour of receiving their orders. As far as they knew, there were definitely three, possibly four captives. Tachibana Aimi hadn’t been accounted for, but there was a chance their informant just hadn’t seen her. If she had gotten separated from the group, there was always the hope they would find her beforehand and get a decent report on what had happened as her team was captured.

Hiashi was tense the entire run towards the last sighting of the missing team.

This mission was going to be a long one, even if it was only meant to last a few days. That much Shikaku could guarantee.

* * *

Aimi had been hysterical, but vague as ever. It had taken far too long to get her out of her anxious breakdown, but it had been Suigetsu's idea to try and distract her.

Her swords. Her freaking swords are what got Aimi out of her anxiety. Suigetsu had laughed, immediately saying he was adopting her as his protégé.

“Come on, deongsaeng. She likes sharp and deadly things. She’s the perfect student for me!”

“That's what I'm worried about.”

“Why?”

At least Kakashi was amused by their antics. Though he was keeping his distance.

Ren glanced back to Aimi. “Aimi, you need to tell us what happened to you. Where’s your team?”

Aimi may have liked her sword, but once the similarity went away she was hesitant to trust Ren at all. “I’m not supposed to give information to foreign nin.”

“I’m not a foreign shinobi, Aimi. I’m just undercover.”

“Then why don’t you drop your cover?” Aimi being this serious and focused was off-putting for Ren. Even more than that, though, she had to wonder what had happened to her team that the girl was so shaken.

“Because I’ve wrecked my body enough I might not be able to get it back up, now please. Tell me what happened.”

She glanced at Kakashi. “You’re a Konoha shinobi.”

“Yes…” Ren could tell where this was going, and that was making her nervous. There was no guarantee Kakashi would back her up. 

“You trust her?”

“She is who she says she is, and I trust my team.”

“Do you trust her?” 

So it wasn’t just Ren that noticed the ambiguity. Meeting Kakashi’s eyes, she raised an eyebrow.

Kakashi sighed. “I trust Nara Riko. From what I’ve seen, I trust Choi Chae-Seon. Akagi Ren I’m on the fence about. She is all three individuals, so yes. A majority of the time, I trust her.”

Aimi swallowed before looking at her. It wasn’t an easy idea to stomach, how someone’s identity could be so thoroughly changed while they were undercover. It had been hard as Ren had moved around Kiri to deal with, and she was in the thick of it. Aimi had just gotten into the shinobi lifestyle, as far as Ren could guess. She knew very well what could possibly happen, having had her brother die so young, but there were still parts of the shinobi life she hadn’t been exposed to in detail yet.

She was doing really well, being confronted by this for the first time.

“So which are you right now?”

Her old sensei made her want to say Riko. Aimi made her want to say Riko. The fact that she was about to see her family for the first time in years, her best friend, her brother, her _boyfriend,_ the concept of which was a bit weird to think about in the context of her mission, but still filled her with excitement… It made her want to say she was Riko.

The mission pushed her to say Akagi Ren.

It was her friend being there that made the choice though. Her friend that had her back unquestioningly, even knowing she was going to leave one day. Her genin team she would be going back to train. Her friends in Kiri. Seonsaengnim. The language she had come to love just as much as she loved Japanese. 

She wasn’t quite Riko anymore, and Ren was still a shell and mask for who she was. She didn’t want to be Ren, and she didn’t want to push herself into being Riko again. She wanted to be her.

“I’m Choi Chae-Seon. I am a Kirigakure jounin and I train a team of genin. Pleased to meet you.”

And Aimi began to talk. And once Chae-Seon had heard enough, she had left her with Kakashi and Suigetsu, taking off in the direction Aimi said her cousin and other former student had been taken.

* * *

Hiashi and Shikaku had eyes on the hideout where the team was being held. There was still no confirmation on any village affiliations, but Shikaku was fairly certain there wouldn’t be any. If this was the work of bandits – not likely, given Neji’s skill level – then there was only filing names, and there wouldn’t be work beyond that. If this was the operation of any of the other villages, they would cover their tracks as thoroughly as they could, leaving no trace they had ever been involved.

The hideout was a small house built into a hill, meaning there could be an entire network to search beneath it and they wouldn’t know until they got inside.

“Why aren’t they switching guards?”

Shikaku shrugged the question off. “I couldn’t tell you. All I can tell you is that we’re going to have to work around that.”

A new chakra signature showed up, off toward the East of the building. Shikaku caught glimpse of a woman, watching as she flickered into existence behind one of the guards, killing him and burning the body within seconds.

It was better for his sanity if he pretended he didn’t just watch his daughter carry out what was to her just another assassination on a list of assassinations. Instead he focused on keeping Hiashi from storming in and rushing to make sure she didn’t endanger their mission.

She dispatched of the less obvious outdoor guards before moving towards the more obvious ones, keeping most of them silent as she could while taking them out, and ensuring those that saw her didn’t have much of a chance to put up a fight. She had, evidently, sensed Shikaku and Hiashi, because she flickered to their location, just behind them. Shikaku turned and got the first glimpse he had in nearly three years at his daughter.

She looked like the pictures he had seen, but there was something in her the pictures hadn’t caught. She stood straight, but her hands curved in, as though there was supposed to be a weapon in them. Her eyes were sharp, honed in on the two of them, likely already creating plans. Her hitai-ite was nowhere to be seen.

“Choi Chae-Seon. Nice to meet you.”

“I believe you’re more known as Akagi Ren, isn’t that right, Nara-san?”

A clever misdirect on Hiashi’s part, as if there were anyone listening they wouldn’t have thought twice about the address.

Riko rolled her eyes. “I’ve gotten rid of the guards. Aimi is safe, so we’re only going after the other three. Who is their sensei?” So she had dropped all pretense with them for this mission.

“Neji.”

Riko nodded. “Alright. They’ll probably have him separated from the other two. They don’t seem like much, but they are definitely Kiri-trained, if their stances were anything to go by, but no one I’ve met.

“There’s a whole class of untrained or informally trained mercs running around since the war. Be careful. If that’s what we’re dealing with, they’ve put their strongest inside to protect their leader.”

“That doesn’t make much tactical sense, though.” Shikaku glanced at empty field. Someone could come out at any time, see the lack of guards, and raise the alarm. “They wouldn’t want us to get in.”

“They don’t really learn tactics, just how to keep the power structure alive.

“Let them raise the alarm. They’ll swarm out here, but it’ll give us a way in. Take off your headbands, any metal plating will raise some suspicions.”

“And why should we follow your plan?” Hiashi didn’t seem too keen on Riko, watching her as though she was going to turn on him any moment now.

“Because from a purely tactical standpoint, I’ve been doing infiltration missions for almost two years. I’ve got a lot of experience getting in and out of places I’m not wanted and making sure no one finds the bodies.”

Shikaku sighed. Tsunade had informed him of the conditions for sending Kakashi as an escort for Iruka. He knew she wasn’t obligated to keep it secret. Hiashi already knew, it seemed, and it would waste time to mince his words as though he wasn’t speaking to someone he knew closely and personally. Someone he had watched grow up.  “I know you’re still technically undercover, but please stop talking about killing people like it’s not a big deal. I’d like to think that sending you away _wasn’t_ the worst choice of my life.”

Riko scoffed. “I’m not saying killing isn’t a big deal. I’m just saying I’m pretty damn good at it.

“As for sending me away being a bad choice… what was your first clue? Was it- You know what. Never mind. We can solve this shit in Konoha.” There were people coming out, likely to switch the guard, and shouting filled the space around the hideout. She was right, they really weren’t professional shinobi. “Right now, I’ve got some students to go after. You two feel free to join me.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm on break right now so I'm going to try posting twice this week. I really want to start playing with the dynamic that Riko/Ren/Chae-Seon are all kind of the same person, but at the same time, Riko and Ren represent two extremes of the same individual, whereas Chae-Seon is a blend. This is also why how she is addressed changes based on perspective. Part of who she is in any given moment is who she's with and how they see her. She'll try a bit harder to be Riko for someone like her mom, or Ren for any kind of professional event in Kiri, while with Suigetsu, Chojuro, and Haku she would be Chae-Seon, or her more natural self. 
> 
> Chae-Seon is really not happy with her dad, but she knows she's gotta work through it when she's not on a little sidequest. 
> 
> Chae-Seon means "variegated colors", by the way. I haven't found anywhere to incorporate that in the text, so I figured I could mention it here. 
> 
> It's kind of part of the idea of language and identity that I'm dancing around with Kiri and Korean, and how they view themselves as separate in culture and mindset from the other nations in more ways than one. 
> 
> Maybe I'm putting too much into this, I don't know. All I know is this is the most fun I've had writing in a long time.


	9. Rivals of a Different Mold

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Choi Chae-Seon had hoped never to meet this man again, had hoped to never have to fight him again. He might not have training, but he had some natural skill, and certainly a lot of creativity in battle. A lack of morals might have helped too. 
> 
> Shikaku knows she can hold her own. He's seen her entry in the Bingo Book. But seeing his daughter get injured in a fight hurts him in a way nothing else can. 
> 
> Shikamaru may have just gotten roped into this teaching nonsense, but he wasn't going to admit he liked it. 
> 
> And nothing like a battle and a nosy teammate to help mend fences between family members.

Shikamaru couldn’t deny he was excited to see his sister when his dad had first hinted she might be visiting. But he also knew Riko. She was a survivor, and if surviving meant becoming Akagi Ren and losing Nara Riko, she would do it. She might not like it, but that wouldn’t factor into her decision-making process.

Maybe that’s why he started to wander into the refugee quarter more frequently. Maybe that’s why, when he had met Kim Na-Ri, he had asked her to teach him Korean. His time in the refugee quarter had taught him a word or two, a phrase or three, but nothing he could communicate with. He hadn’t been learning for too long – only the few months since he heard Riko was staying longer in Kiri, and even that was disparate lessons here and there spaced out based on his mission schedule and Na-Ri’s availability. She had a family to feed and had started up a small tailor’s shop. Her oldest daughter, Go-Eun, had started a restaurant with her husband next door that served authentic Kirigakure cuisine to help pay the family bills. Shikamaru had enjoyed it the few times he had gone, and he had taken Chouji with him, which won it an Akimichi seal of approval.

Na-Ri was around his mom’s age, probably a little older, if he had to guess, but soft and sweet where his mom was a hardened shinobi and a taskmaster. He supposed part of it was that his mother lived with two Nara, whereas Na-Ri’s family was extremely motivated on their own.

“Ah, Shika-shi!”

The youngest son in the family, Jae-suk, had entered the Academy recently. He had just turned nine, talked about an older sister that he missed almost constantly, and had asked Shikamaru to help him with his Japanese as soon as he had met him. The kid was definitely sharp, Shikamaru would give him that, but he lost himself in his own head periodically.

But, he _had_ caught onto Japanese very quickly. He had picked up some of the spoken language quickly once his family had settled in Konoha almost three years ago (according to Na-Ri), and even faster once he had joined the Academy. Reading took longer, but the longer he worked with Shikamaru the faster he seemed to pick up new characters and words.

“Hey.”

The kid’s smile was bright, particularly after considering the things Shikamaru had heard about why his family left. What had happened in his village.

To his sister.

And yeah. Maybe he understood why Riko had liked teaching so much. If kids were this happy to see teachers and it was always this rewarding to see someone succeed after helping them, it made sense.

It was still troublesome, though, and he was never going to call it anything else. 

“Look! My sensei’s been giving me extra tests for my reading and writing, since it’s so bad, but I got a hundred on this one!”

It was a short test, only four and a half pages, and Jae-Suk had to read a long passage and then answer two questions and write a few responses. Nothing too involved, but there were a few parts Shikamaru could have seen him getting tripped up on. Questions that were worded to mask their original point, and similar. All things a shinobi had to learn to decipher, no matter the language.

But he had done it. He had aced the test, and even caught on to what his sensei was after in some of the less obvious questions.

“Nice work, kid.”

“Can we start working on harder stuff?”

Shikamaru sighed. “You’re so troublesome. But sure, kid. We can do some harder stuff. What do you want to work on?”

Jae-Suk just grabbed his hand before dragging him to the library.

*

Chae-Seon had teamed up with her father to go after Neji. The Genin, according to Hiashi, had fewer guards around them and in the surrounding areas. He had agreed, after some mild prodding, to retrieve the other two Genin and head toward the area Chae-Seon had left her partner, charge, and Aimi.

As for her and Shikaku, they were trying to find a way towards Neji.

“Do you think you could get in, take care of whatever bastards are in there with him, then run him out while I distract these assholes?”

She recognized one of the faces in the small group of mercenaries outside of where they were holding Neji. He was a tough son of a bitch, and she had gone toe-to-toe with him once before. He had tried to interfere with her mission, and by that she meant she had been caught mid-assassination and had to flee when he started pulling dirty tricks with seals.

Park Dong-Il.

He had been featured in one of Kiri’s less official Bingo Books, which were mostly mercenaries like him, for each of whom whom there was at least one Kiri shinobi with a grudge. Out of spite, none of them were ranked above C, though Dong-Il could easily have made a high B-Rank, and with better training he could easily have matched her.

“Why are you distracting them?” The glance Shikaku gave her told her she was less than subtle about her grudge.

“It’s absolutely not because I have a score to settle with one of those assholes, and entirely because I am confident enough in my abilities to distract them long enough for you to get Neji out of there.”

“You’re lying to me aren’t you.”

“I wouldn’t tell you that, even if I were.”

She was, and they both knew it, which was irritating in and of itself, but she hadn’t even tried to hide it, which irked Shikaku even more. She could at least pretend.

“Fine, but you better not get hurt too badly. We’re travelling back with you now, and I don’t want to deal with your mother’s lectures if you come home covered in blood.”

“That’s perfect, because I don’t want to deal with Suigetsu’s.”

Shikaku leaned back into the hallway they were currently occupying. “Go on, then.”

*

Shikaku didn’t want to let his daughter fight on her own, but there was something to be said for distracting the guards first.

She was a quick shot with her techniques, the kind he saw on battlefields during the war. The kind he had been when he was younger. She didn’t linger either, she had become desensitized to battle.

“Go, you idiot!”

Shikaku didn’t bother responding, ducking instead into the room while she covered him, sliding a sword between him and an enemy as she huffed in irritation. “Hurry the fuck up, you hear me? Get him, get out.”

Shikaku nodded, quickly crossing the room to where Neji was being held. The younger man was worse for wear, several wounds dug into non-lethal areas, blood all over his face. “Come on, Hyuuga. We’re getting out of here.”

“I can’t see very well. I’m afraid I won’t be of much help.”

There was blood in his eyes stemming from a wound along his hairline, but beyond that, Shikaku couldn’t tell if there was anymore damage than that.

He worried he might have missed something. The Caged Bird Seal was an open secret in Konoha, but Shikaku didn’t know enough about it to look for damage. It was still covered by the bandage Neji wore under his headband, but there were no guarantees. It didn’t look like they were after the Byakugan, though. Just trying to get information on Konoha, then?

_“They’re informally trained.”_

That didn’t mean they didn’t know how to use seals or modify them. He would have to pass the boy over to Hiashi to be checked over once he got the chance.

Pulling Neji’s arm over his shoulder, Shikaku positioned him into something workable. Hopefully, Chae-Seon would have the fighting taken care of, but just in case, he wanted to be prepared.

“Agh!” That was Riko. That was his daughter, and she had just been hurt.

There was some screaming, but there were so many people doing so it was hard to tell who it was. Shikaku made an effort not to look as he dragged Neji out of the line of fire, setting him against a wall. He turned the corner to where the fighting was just in time to see his daughter, who had been thrown to the ground, take a kick to the face.

“Son of a bitch!” She didn't stay down long. 

*

Chae-Seon rocked back from the next foot that came towards her face, slamming her hands to the ground and pushing herself up.

“That’s it. I’ve had it with you fuckers.”

Dong-Il smirked. The bastard remembered her, made some comments about her being hard to forget before he took to using his shitty sealwork to push her down.

“I’ve never liked you, Choi-shi. You’re like a gnat.”

“Shut the fuck up.” Chae-Seon ducked the incoming blade of one of the remaining men, responding with her own katana across her opponent’s abdomen before switching out for a water whip. Using it to pull Dong-Il’s lieutenant towards her, she placed a kunai at the man’s throat. “I walk or he dies.”

“Blackmail. How shinobi of you.”

“Being a nuisance. How mercenary of you.” Ren pulled the kunai closer to the man’s throat. He had gone still, knowing he would have to play his cards right to get out of this.

Her dad was off to the side, creeping up on Dong-Il, and she was suddenly so glad the bastard had limited chakra capabilities. Yeah, he could use seals, and it was rumored he was a descendant of the Uzumaki, but she had fought him, and he never shut up. He had bragged before about how he didn’t need to use chakra for fancy jutsu, or to sense it. He didn’t need it, because he wasn’t a shinobi. All he needed were his seals and his sub-par skills with manipulation.

Thank fuck for that nonsense.

Shaking her head slightly at her father, she knew she had to time this right. From the small glimpse she had seen, Neji needed medical attention, meaning she couldn’t afford to be more injured than she already was. A slash to her arm was still bleeding, but she wasn’t going to pay it much attention.

She had other priorities, one of which was the comrade that was in the nearby hallway and _wouldn’t Shikaku just fucking listen and follow the fucking plan?_

Scoffing, she gave up on her blackmail plan, Shikaku coming steadily closer to Dong-Il.

She admitted it. She was worried he was getting in over his head, underestimating an opponent because she had said he didn’t have formal training. Chae-Seon was just as much Ren as she was Riko, and no matter who she was, her family was important to her.

No matter how angry she got, her _father_ was important to her.

In one quick motion she left her hostage bleeding on the ground, pulling out the Kiba and spiraling towards Dong-Il. Her arm felt like it was ripping apart as she charged the swords with lightning chakra, embedding them both into Dong-Il while also forcing Shikaku away. She had probably made the scarring on her arms worse, forcing lightning through a wound like that, but she didn’t exactly care at the moment.

Dong-Il, for his part, had a seal ready. It was haphazard and poorly made, as most of his seals were, but it did the trick in redirecting the lightning chakra into the water on the ground, pushing it back at Ren. It burned, and she cursed at him until she had enough control of her body to move out of the way of an attack.

An attack that should have come, but was blocked by her father, who was taking up Dong-Il’s attention.

“I’ll never get it with you damn ninja. You never fucking give up.” Dong-Il tried to push his way past Shikaku to Chae-Seon.

Shikaku dived to meet him, slicing at his stomach with a kunai. Chae-Seon stood up, pulling the Kiba to her sides. “You son of a bitch. You don’t get to attack the people I care about. Not anymore!”

She had never lost a comrade in battle. But she had lost a friend. A sweet civilian girl who would make her drop her weapons at the door before having her in for tea, where they weren’t allowed to talk about the war.

She had been inside the base, a skilled herbalist and medic, even without chakra. She should have been safe. But she had enough friends in high places, that when Dong-Il wanted information, he went after her. He took her from within the base while most of the higher-level shinobi were away on a joint mission, and Ren hadn’t seen her after that. She had only seen pieces of remains or possessions. A piece of cloth, an earring, maybe, but never a full body.

Never enough to know if she was actually dead. Only enough to assume.

Ren dodged the seal this time, and she pushed her blade as far into Dong-Il as she could, screaming as he used some chakra to try and throw it back into her. The difference, however, was that she had trained to control lightning, whereas he hadn’t.

It made not passing out much easier, as the lightning around them went haywire. Quickly cancelling the chakra to her swords, Ren sent them back into the seal on her shoulder. Instead, she pulled water towards her, focusing it. Condensing it.

It had been Suigetsu’s idea, once she had come clean after a long and grueling session with the Kiba, to adapt the jutsu into something smaller and usable. Something that could get her out of a tough spot if need be. His reasoning, she knew, had another layer to it.

It would force her to face it. She would have to take responsibility for the attack that had killed forty-some people.

Now, she was more than grateful as she jabbed it into the hand and knife that were coming towards her. The knife started to warp from the pressure, and over Dong-Il's screams, she could hear the bones in the hand break as its flesh squelched, leaving his hand up to the wrist badly disfigured with an open would bleeding quickly steadily as she backed away, grabbing her father’s arm and running towards Neji.

“I told you to take him and run!”

“And leave you to get hurt?”

“Yes! I can handle myself!”

“Those wounds would suggest otherwise.”

Chae-Seon yanked Neji towards her, throwing an arm over her shoulder, ignoring the cries of pain. She had a few moments to get them ahead of Dong-Il, and she couldn’t waste that on comfort at the moment. “I’m fine.”

“Should we worry about him?”

“I don’t know, and I don’t want to wait around to find out.”

Shikaku huffed. “Pass him here, Chae-Seon. You’re injured.”

“I’ve had worse, I’ve got him.” Chae-Seon glanced behind her. There was a small trickle of blood on the floor, likely from his hand.

Maybe he’d passed out from blood loss. Maybe they could get out of there. Even if he hadn’t, she could hope he was slowed down.

Chae-Seon pushed herself faster. “Come on!”

*

“She’s going to come back bleeding, and I’m going to have to fight her to actually let me treat her, and it’s gonna be a thing.

“Why the fuck does she always do this?”

Kakashi laughed as Suigetsu paced. “Nice to know some things never change.”

“What do you mean?” Suigetsu perked. If this meant learning more about a young Chae-Seon, it was more than worth it to put his worry aside for a moment.

“She’s always been reckless.” Kakashi shrugged.

“And…” Suigetsu had to fight the urge to kill his charge. One, he knew he would need Ren to really beat him. Two, there was a certain amount of fun for him in trying to pry stories and the like out of the man.

“And what?” That damn eye smile.

He was going to win this man over eventually. For now, though, he was going to go back to the girl he was supposed to be watching. The girl that was currently looking at his sword intently, as though she could figure out how he used it just from looking at it.

“How do you use this?”

“Like a sword.”

“But it doesn’t look like one. It looks like one of those big paper crop things that Iruka-sensei uses sometimes!”

So Umino had been a teacher before he came to Kiri… interesting.

 “Well it is one. It’s a special sword.”

“Special? Is that why it has all those papers on it?”

“Those papers are explosion tags, kid. Be careful around them.”

“Why so many different ones, then?”

“They’ve got their own effects.”

Her eyes were alight as she asked more questions about his sword, pointing to different papers and asking questions, before finally asking to hold it.

*

Hiashi had gotten Hanabi and Chie out, and he was keeping them safe, but he didn’t want to leave yet. He had promised the Hokage to make sure all members of the team made it out, and that included Neji.

And beyond that, as much as he loathed to admit it, he was worried for the Nara still inside the base. Shikaku hadn’t been out in the field, as far as Hiashi knew, since the scuffles at the border two years ago. RIko… He would admit, she had been an excellent influence on his younger daughter, encouraging her to have some spirit. He might not have liked her particular brand of attitude or teaching techniques, but his daughter cared for her teammates. That was something worthy of respect, and he knew it in large part had come from Riko.

But she had been gone for two years, meaning  he had no clue the full scope of her abilities. Perhaps he should have been keeping a better eye on the Kirigakure section of the Bingo Books that crossed his desk every so often.

His musing (and worrying over his daughter) was broken by the shouting of Nara Riko, still disguised as Choi Chae-Seon, as she pulled Neji alongside her. It was somewhat comical, given Neji was no small amount taller than her, so she was essentially dragging him along.

As they came closer, he noticed the twitch in her hands, the blood on her sleeve, and the gritted teeth. She had been hurt, and it looked bad.

He really didn’t want to know what had happened in Kiri to the spunky girl that he had begrudgingly respected.

*

Shikaku insisted on taking Neji once Chae-Seon tripped, her leg locking as part of her body spasmed.

“You need medical attention, Choi-san.” Hiashi, he noticed, refused to word it as a question. Good, he needed someone else to help him gang up on his daughter. It turned out Kiri hadn’t gotten rid of her stubborn streak. If anything, the independence of being completely cut off from everyone and stranded in a foreign country had made it worse.

“Nope. Not until those three are safe and have been treated.”

“And how are you going to treat them if you don’t have decent chakra control?” Shikaku raised an eyebrow. He had been electrocuted before. He knew how hard it could be to keep everything under control until the body healed.

“Eh. Suigetsu’s got some basic healing knowledge. First aid, and the like. He might not know actual jutsu for it, but if I can’t take care of it, he can.”

“And why would I trust a foreigner to treat my family?” It was Hiashi asking, but there was a small part of Shikaku that wondered the same thing. He had read about the young man before, and he seemed to have a violent streak and a tendency towards reckless behavior. Shikaku wasn’t sure he trusted the amount of confidence Chae-Seon placed in him either. This was a shinobi that went off the grid for years before being showing up in the middle of a war.

Either way, he had little choice. Chae-Seon wasn’t going to be deterred, and at least this way he might learn a thing or two about her life in Kiri.

*

Chae-Seon regarded Suigetsu like a brother. She really did.

But that came with the territory of having him be a goddamn mother-hen when he wanted to be, which was whenever one of their team was bleeding at all. She could understand, to some extent. He was pretty damn hard to injure, so to him bleeding was a rarity. It had to freak him out sometimes that his teammates were so fragile comparatively.

Still. The first words he said when she walked in (hiding the fact that she had been electrocuted pretty damn well in her opinion) didn’t have to be “Don’t fucking lie to me this time. What happened?”

“Nothing.”

“Bullshit, and you know it.”

Hiashi scowled. “Do you have to use such language?”

Suigetsu, never one to take a comment like that lying down unless it was from Haku, snarled at him. “Look man, I know I’m supposed to be diplomatic and all, but what I say to my teammate doesn’t concern you.” He rounded back to Chae-Seon. “Now spill. What happened?”

“Nothing! Just a fight, nothing out of the ordinary.”

“Yeah, and your hand just happens to be shaking like a little pre-genin during their first real sparring match because you want it to.”

She had thought her hands were clenched. Apparently not.

“Absolutely.”

Suigetsu pulled a medical kit out of his supplies, pushing her down on the ground. “Pull your damn sleeve up. I’m going to stitch your arm up, and then I’ll drag what happened out of you. I don’t care if I have to use some of Haku’s methods.”

“You wouldn’t.”

“Wouldn’t I?”

Her dad laughed from where he sat, evidently enjoying her suffering.

“Do you have something to contribute, Old Man?”

“Hey, that’s my dad. Have some respect.”

“Oh. My bad. Have something to contribute, Senile Old Man?”

“Senile?” Shikaku’s brow furrowed as he regarded Suigetsu. “Where do you get ‘senile’?”

“I figured that’s what you had to be to send your – ouch!” Chae-Seon threw a punch at him, aggravating her cut, but stopping what could devolve into an argument. “What the hell, Deongsaeng? First when your teacher shows up, and now this?”

_“This is my battle to fight, asshole. Stay out of it.”_

_“But you’re my Deongsaeng.”_ Suigetsu scowled. _“What else am I supposed to do?”_

“I said stay out of it, Oppa.” She yanked the needle from him, suturing her own arm, much to the disgust of the three genin. And probably her father, if she thought about it. “I’m gonna take care of it when we get to the village.”

“Fine, whatever. Just stop punching me.”

“Stop getting in my business and I’ll stop punching you.” Chae-Seon froze before her head rocketed from her arm towards Suigetsu. “Don’t you dare. Don’t you fucking dare.”

The evil glint in his eyes was enough to tell her she was fighting a losing battle.

“So, Nara-san. You’re Chae-Seon’s dad, right?” Shikaku nodded in response, apprehensive. Good. As far as Chae-Seon was concerned, right now Suigetsu could not be trusted. “Do you have any funny stories from when she was younger?”

Chae-Seon scowled as her father’s eyes lit up. Evidently, despite Suigetsu’s anger with the man and her dad’s trepidation with a foreign shinobi he barely knew, a friendship was forming.

“Oppa, I swear to God, I’m going to gut you like a fish and leave your remains in a river.”

“Yeah, I’ll believe it when I see it, Deongsaeng.” Suigetsu turned back to Shikaku, who had offered up a story from when she was still in the Academy. “Now shut up, I want to hear this.”

"Well, I can tell you a couple from when she was in the Academy..."

"Dad! You're supposed to be on my side!" 

*

Chae-Seon had insisted they stay a night in a nearby town to give the Genin and Neji a chance to recuperate before they were running back to Konoha.

Shikaku had watched her carefully all night, but something still bugged him. He only made the decision to ask about it once they were alone.

“You can ask for help when you’re injured.”

“I know.”

“Just because you’ve had worse, that doesn’t mean you have to deal with things alone.”

Chae-Seon looked him in the eye. “What are you getting at?”

Shikaku sat down next to her. “You refused to take help when getting Neji out of there. You refused help during the fight, even though you knew he was dangerous. You knew even more about him than I did, but you wouldn’t take any help.”

“It’s not that I wouldn’t take help. It’s that I wasn’t going to let you get hurt when you were the best shot at making sure Neji got out alive. Park Dong-Il was going to go after me the second he saw me, and that was a given. He doesn’t know you, he couldn’t care less about you. He probably went for the first Konoha headband he saw, and didn’t give a shit about who it was, just that he knew the oldest on that particular squad probably had the information he wanted.

“I’ve fought this guy before, and yeah he’s a merc, but he’s not your average merc. He’s got some kind of shinobi training, as far as I can tell, but nothing concrete enough for actual jutsu.”

“But you wouldn’t let Suigetsu help you when you got back. You wouldn’t let someone treat you.” Shikaku set a hand on her shoulder. It wounded him a little when she tensed up. “Riko…”

“Chae-Seon.”

“Chae-Seon. You can’t go through life as a shinobi pushing people away.”

“That’s what you thought I was doing?” Chae-Seon laughed. “Suigetsu hates blood. He can stitch people up if he has to, and he does a bang-up job with first-aid, but he only learned it because Haku insisted we all know it.

“He’ll do anything for one of us, and that means dealing with seeing us bleed if it means helping us. The least I could do was make sure he didn’t have to.”

“You care for your team a lot.”

“Of course I do. Those three have my back, no matter what. There’s a reason we rent an apartment together, and it’s not just because it’s cheaper that way.”

“You trust them? All of them?”

“With my life.”

He could live with that.

*

The young boy clinging to her son’s side was a welcome distraction from her husband’s late return. Jae-Suk was short, had light pink hair, and a large smile. He was chattering at Shikamaru, asking him about different words and characters throughout the text they were looking over.

“And you said that one means ‘income credit’, right?”

“Shikamaru,” Yoshino peaked at the book. It was a drab one about the Konoha tax system. “Why are you making him read a book about taxes?”

“Don’t look at me, he picked it out.” Shikamaru shrugged. “Kid was all over the damn law and economics books. Couldn’t get him to give them up, so I made him pick one topic and stick to it.”

Yoshino laughed. “Well, as long as you’re enjoying yourself, Jae-Suk-kun. Would you like to stay for dinner?”

“My mom doesn’t know where I am, though.” Jae-Suk fidgeted in his seat. “I don’t want her to worry… After my sister…”

“Your sister?”

Jae-Suk shook his head, standing and heading toward the door. “I should head home.”

“Jae-Suk-kun, wait!”

Jae-Suk paused. “What?”

Yoshino glanced at Shikamaru before looking back at Jae-Suk. She grabbed some of the dinner she had prepared, putting it into a box. “Well, if you’re not staying, you could at least take some food.

“It’s late. It’s entirely possible your family has already eaten.”

“Ah…” Jae-Suk took the box. He smiled as the smells within met his nostrils. “Thank you, Nara-shi!” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Update 2 for the week, friends! 
> 
> With the amount of civilian refugees that would likely have left Kiri as soon as they got the chance, I gotta figure they would go to the nearest cities and villages first, and the most protected, just in case. Bring a huge language/culture difference into the mix, and you get like a mini-Koreatown in Konoha. 
> 
> Quick note, while Korean did borrow Chinese characters (called Hanja), the written language doesn't use it nearly as much as Japanese, and learners of Korean often aren't taught Hanja. The use of Hangeul/Hangul (the Korean alphabet) means a large number of words are written out instead of given ideographs. 
> 
> This relates to a side historical character mentioned 2 chapters ago, Se-Jong. There was an actual King Se-Jong in Korea, and he is widely credited with being the reason Hangul exists. Many sources credit him with the creation of Hangul, though others point to a team of scholars he had work on it. He created the system to be easy to learn because he thought mending illiteracy and making reading and writing more accessible to the people would help Korea in the long run. You can read about him online. He's one of 2 kings (I might be wrong on this one) to have "the Great" used after his name as a standard practice. 
> 
> A little off-topic, but I wanted to make some notes about it here because I wanted to mend any confusion for why Jae-Suk would have trouble reading. He wouldn't have learned the Chinese characters because, excepting (in the real world, and paralleled in this one) high level texts, his education would never have felt the need to include them, especially given how young he was when he left Kiri.


	10. Welcome Back

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She got back at night, and her first morning was... eventful. 
> 
> Chae-Seon may miss Konoha, but she can't say it's any less crazy than Kiri.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chag sameach! 
> 
> I'm sorry this is later than normal, I was at a Seder. To all my Jewish readers (if there are any), happy Passover! Let the no-bread-week commence. 
> 
> This chapter wasn't edited. I might go back later, but if there are any critical parts that feel off, let me know. It's super late right now, so I have to finish my midterm, go to sleep, and spend tomorrow writing a research proposal. With this midterm hanging over my head, this chapter is mostly filler. I wanted to get something out tonight, but I didn't have as much time to dedicate to a really good chapter. 
> 
> I love all of you!

Neji’s eyesight had gotten better once the blood had been rinsed out of his eyes (courtesy of Chae-Seon), but it was still very uncomfortable looking through them for long periods of time. As soon as Chae-Seon had noticed it, she had forced him to cover his eyes for periods of time, relying on his uncle as a guide.

“So let me get this straight.” The man called Suigetsu, who, like Chae-Seon, seemed to have multiple names. “You can mother-hen people all you like, but when you’re hurt I don’t get to do it?”

“I’m also a trained medic.” There was the sound of someone being hit. “JONG-MIN! What the hell was that?”

“Payback’s a bitch, ain’t she?”

Whatever happened between the two next was quiet, but had the girls laughing (and Shikaku, but Neji would like to think the Jounin commander was composed enough not to laugh at the antics of two overly energetic Kiri-nin, even if one of them was his daughter) and Neji wishing he wasn’t blindfolded.

“We’re almost to Konoha, Hyuuga-san. Let me take your blindfold off.”

Chae-Seon looked remarkably like herself. Despite the changes to her face, it was strange to consider her different from Nara Riko in anything but skill and personality. She had disappeared and all the Hokage would tell anyone who asked was that she was on a long-term training assignment. Neji would admit, he had been worried for the last member of Team 7. Naruto and Sasuke had highly-powered shinobi to protect them.

And now he wondered why he was ever worried about Riko to begin with. She was like the other members of her team.

Completely reckless, completely unpredictable, and damn near impossible to kill.

The gates were, indeed, in sight. Suigetsu cuffed Chae-Seon’s head when she sighed, however quietly it may have been. Neji had barely heard it, meaning no one else had. Suigetsu said something to her before she scowled at him. “Yeah, yeah. I know.”

Shikaku glanced back at them, raising an eyebrow. “Everything alright?”

Chae-Seon shrugged. “Sure.”

* * *

Tsunade had been waiting at the gate hours. The sun had gone down already, and it was getting late. They were supposed to be here already, and she would be damned if she didn’t make sure Riko was dragged to her office for a full debriefing, still undercover or not.

(And if she was worried about the little runt, she wouldn’t admit it. Not out in the open, in front of Izumo and Kotetsu. She was still bitter about that bet she lost against them two weeks ago. Damned brats.)

“Hokage-sama, don’t you have work to do?” The cheeky grin on Izumo’s face was just one more reason not to say a damn thing about why she decided they needed ‘supervised’ today of all days.

“Yes, I do. And I’m doing it. Now don’t _you_ have work to do?”

“Gate duty is pretty dull, Hokage-sama. You know that.

“Or are you just hoping we trip up after that bet?”

She was going to pound the bastard into the ground if Kakashi and his ‘escort’ team didn’t get here soon.

“Nothing of the sort, Kamizuki-kun. As Hokage, it is merely my job to make sure all of my shinobi are living up to their potential.

“Imagine my surprise when I saw that two of my shinobi have been working the gate day in and day out for months, even years on end. I just wanted to make sure the two of you weren’t suited for something else.”

Kotetsu, shuffling through a few papers, muttered, “You expect us to believe that crap?”

“What was that, Hagane?”

“Ah! Nothing, Hokage-sama!”

“That’s what I thought.” She sensed several chakra signatures coming closer. “Incoming.”

As they got closer, she took a moment to look at the disguise on Riko. Something must have happened, because she looked a lot closer to Nara Riko now than in any of the photographs she had seen. That would be a serious problem, especially since she was going back.

Her partner was familiar, but she couldn’t place the name. She had looked through the reports when she got them, but time to more thoroughly acquaint herself with the information on Riko’s team was slim.

“Hokage-sama.” Most of the group bowed while the Kiri shinobi and Riko argued between them.

“I don’t know the damn protocol! What makes you think I would know it?”

“Because you’re _from_ Kiri? You’re telling me you have no idea how we address foreign Kage?”

“None. Or did you forget I spent most of my free time the last however many years locked up in a tank and experimented on by that snake-loving fuck?”

She filed away the information about a ‘snake-loving fuck’, assuming it was Orochimaru, before focusing on her shinobi. This wasn’t the Nara girl that looked at her like she was a role-model and leader, but it wasn’t the hardened shinobi of her file either.

“Hokage-sama.” She bowed lower than was technically required, elbowing her partner as she did. “It is a pleasure.”

Tsunade scoffed. “Drop the act, Nara. Mei should have told you your cover doesn’t matter within Konoha.”

“Ao did mention something about that…” Little shit was pretending she didn’t know. Tsunade could see it in her eyes, the gleam Naruto got when he found a new prank target.

Kotetsu and Izumo looked between each other before looking back to Riko. “That’s Riko? Little Nara Riko?”

“Well, Deongsaeng, looks like you’re gonna be exposed whether you like it or not.”

“Oppa, shut up.”

Kotetsu’s brow furrowed. “Your name is ‘Oppa’, then?” He reached for a pen and the form for foreign shinobi entry, stiffening when Riko started laughing.

“Hey! What’s so funny?”

“Nothing!” She kept snickering as she spoke. Tsunade looked at Suigetsu, blanching a bit when she saw the slight fear in his eyes. “Nothing, I promise! Just… please, please keep calling him Oppa!”

“No! Don’t keep calling me ‘Oppa’! It’s creepy!”

Tsunade was hesitant to even go near that one, but Izumo beat her to the punch. “So what does ‘oppa’ mean?”

Suigetsu slapped a hand over Riko’s mouth, the hand turning to water as she bit down on it. “It’s the word a chick uses for an older guy friend or her brother! You’re not a chick, so don’t use it!”

Izumo’s eyes gleamed, and Tsunade remembered all too late the pranks that Naruto had pulled by switching genders. Soon enough, Izumo was standing, Henge’d into a (thankfully, fully clothed) woman, batting her eyes at Suigetsu. “Are you sure about that…

“Oppa?”

She was running a madhouse, she was sure of it. Why did she ever think talking to two trouble-making career-chuunin was a good idea in the first place?

“I’m younger than you, asshole!”

Riko was fully laughing now, unable to control herself. She walked up to Izumo, offering a high-five that the Chuunin, already having dropped the Henge, accepted readily. “If I had known it would piss him off that much, I would have blackmailed Dae-Suk into it months ago!”

“What blackmail do you have on Chojuro?” Suigetsu seemed intrigued.

“I’m not handing it over unless you give me something good on Haku.”

“Oh, come on, Deongsaeng-“

Tsunade interrupted befofe this could get too much further out of hand. “Nara Riko, you are to bring your charge and follow me to the Hokage Tower, where I expect a full report on your activities during your mission. We’ll take care of all entry paperwork there.

“Hagane, Kamizuki, you two better straighten up if you ever want to climb higher in the ranks.”

She pretended not to hear Kotetsu mumble about being fine staying a Chuunin. It would be nice to pretend there was some ambition in those two, even if she was glad they were leading lives that made them happy.

* * *

Suigetsu had been left outside of the office while her father and sensei were dragged into the Hokage’s office with Chae-Seon.

It reminded him of all the times he and his brother did stupid shit, and his mother would reprimand them one at a time, making them wait while the other one was punished. Jong-Min and Hyun-Seok, completely inseparable. Until Hyun-Seok became Mangetsu, and suddenly he was working for the Mizukage – working for the man that had killed their _father_ , and mission report be damned, there was no way that was an accident – and that was only the beginning.

Their mother died. He was twelve, and because of his brother, Yagura had an interest in him. He had to become a shinobi to support himself, and he was teamed up with ‘Mangetsu’. He had to play nice or be out of a job and on the streets.

Then Orochimaru happened, and as years passed by he didn’t get a shred of news until Chae-Seon and Ao showed up, dragged him back, and the Mizukage filled him in. Mangetsu was dead, his clan had scattered in the aftermath of the last war and the bloodline purges, and he had nowhere to go.

Yeah. This felt a lot like it did back home. And for a second, he could pretend he was a kid again, that all that shit hadn’t happened, and that Hyun-Seok would walk through the door any second now, pretending to feel properly admonished, already planning their next little adventure.

He knew Chae-Seon was probably getting chewed out, and he would do anything to be able to back her up if he could. But he couldn’t, and as much as that sucked, he was going to take this brief moment and appreciate it. He was going to let himself be Jong-Min again for the first time in a long time. Just for a minute.

* * *

Tsunade was not pleased. The girl in front of her had been run through the wringer, and from what she could see it hadn’t been too long ago.

“Care to explain that?” The shirt she was wearing was torn across the upper arm, the fabric stained a dirty brown-red from what was undoubtedly blood.

“Park Dong-Il is an asshole. That’s about all I’ve got for you.”

“Park Dong-Il?”

“Kiri native, non-shinobi mercenary, and that’s all I’ve got on him. We don’t collect much more on the mercenaries, since most of them are heading out to find something more profitable than whatever loyalists might still be undercover. Yagura’s dead, and his wealthier supporters have all gone missing, if you catch my drift.”

Tsunade did. They had been assassinated, according to intelligence. Many of them with a ruthless efficiency that left minimal blood, the bodies gone or destroyed beyond recognition before anyone could get to them.

Tsunade decided to leave this Park Dong-Il matter where it stood. Shikaku had taken up residence by the door, Kakashi stood behind Riko.

“So, Akagi Ren, huh?”

“I prefer Choi Chae-Seon, but yeah. That’s what my bingo book entry says. Though the more people you let it slip to, the more likely that’s going to be updated.”

“I’ll take my chances.

“You didn’t seem to mind being called little. I would think someone with your background,” and the guilt when she brought up what she had forced the girl to go through weighed on her chest like rocks, “would take offense at something like that. To be associated with naivete…”

The girl in front of her barked a laugh. “Jong-Min, I mean, Suigetsu’s been calling me a midget since we met.”

Tsunade, for all her attempts, hadn’t gotten a rise out of her. Her temper was certainly more even-keeled than she had anticipated, and she was grateful for that. At least her brat was still composed, if more crass than she remembered.

“You have a genin team?”

“Yeah.”

“What are they like?”

“Why do you want to know?”

“I want an alliance with Kiri. It would be nice to know what their next generation is looking like.” She would play the games she had to. After all, ‘Chae-Seon’ was still undercover, even if she was back in Konoha’s borders. This whole conversation would probably be relayed to the Mizukage; nothing in it was technically classified.

“They’re smart as whips. I’m pretty sure Mi-Na’s notes could compromise most of the people she meets, but she’s got her head on right.

“Jae-Un is the most likely to move to Chuunin within the year. She’s reckless, yeah, but she’s got the drive and the raw power.

“Ji-Su is still getting used to the idea of being a non-wartime shinobi, not to mention shinobi in general. She’s adaptable, so I’m not really worried for her career-wise. Is that what you wanted to know, Hokage-sama?”

“Do any of them speak Japanese?”

“Jae-Un knows a few phrases, but other than that, no. They’re all Kiri natives that originally had no intent to join the shinobi ranks. Besides, even if they had, the Academy only just reopened.”

Tsunade hoped to have Riko back in-village within a year, so she would take what she could get. If she played her cards right, she could get more information from her to use in negotiations with Terumi.

“It would be appreciated, given the emboldened moves made by the Akatsuki as of late, if youyou’re your partner could assist us with the security of our Jinchuuriki while you are in our village. Other than that, you are dismissed.”

Chae-Seon bowed. “Understood. Thank you, Hokage-sama.”

When the door opened, she heard good-natured bickering between her and her teammate for a brief second.

“Kakashi, good luck.”

Shikaku smirked at that. “I’m going to drag them back home with me, if there isn’t anything you need from me, Hokage-sama.”

“Dismissed. Both of you.”

* * *

Yoshino smiled. The morning sun was streaming in her house, and for the first time in a long time she had both of her children under her roof.

“Ri.”

“Shika.”

“What the hell was that?”

And already the shoji board was out. “It was my move.”

Shikamaru scoffed. There as a laugh from the doorway. Hoozuki Suigetsu had slept in a guest room, but had been up with Chae-Seon and the sun. “This isn’t going to be like that time you played Ao, right?”

“Of course not. Compared to Shikamaru, Ao’s small fry.” Her face was scrunched in concentration. “And you don’t even qualify as an opponent. Your strategy is move pieces around and hope for the best.”

“But isn’t that every strategy in a nutshell?”

Yoshino chuckled from the kitchen. Chae-Seon may have grown up around shoji, but it seemed her friend had a very different background regarding strategy.

She could hear Shikamaru sigh while she pulled plates out of the cupboard. “Where do you find these people?”

“In swamps and illegal underground research facilities. Why? Where do you meet people?”

“What?”

And there went her peaceful morning.

* * *

Chae-Seon and Jong-Min had been quick to leave that morning after Shikamaru got a glint in his eye and his posture became suddenly very straight and stiff. The introductions of Suigetsu and Team 7 had been entertaining to watch, but now they were stuck waiting around for Kakashi to show.

“I thought he made a point of only being an hour late?”

Karin’s brow furrowed. The girl was nice enough, but seemed mildly terrified of speaking to Chae-Seon, like she was going to be attacked if she didn’t make a good impression.

“He’s never been less than two hours late.”

Chae-Seon laughed. “Well, I’m bored. Oppa, any ideas?”

“Yeah. I got a couple.”

Team 7 shuddered at the looks on their faces.

* * *

Kakashi arrived to his team’s grounds after his little talk with Tsunade about Riko and her partner and was immediately suspicious. His team was standing, back-to-back, looking around the silent and still area as though they expected an attack from anywhere.

He didn’t understand until he went to walk out and felt someone pull him back. “Play along, yeah? We started just doing some basic training maneuvers, and now we’re basically playing War.”

“What do you mean playing War?”

Chae-Seon glanced at the field, keeping an eye on her targets. “It’s a game in Kiri that ninja teams like to play on their downtime. You basically go at each other with no hesitations, and you keep going until one team forfeits. It was a way to get the non-shinobi up to speed on some tactics and combat situations in a relatively controlled environment

“The other seonsaengnim-dur and I have considered making our Genin run it. There are only a handful of teams anyway, so setting up a couple rounds shouldn’t be too hard.”

 “So how do I ‘play along’?”

“You either fight Jong-Min and I, or you side with us. You pick your side in this battle.”

Kakashi sighed. “They need the teamwork training anyway.”

And if Sasuke and Naruto could use a little bit of humbling after their training missions? Well, he never said it.

* * *

Iruka felt like he was drowning. It was like Jeong-Hwa and Soo-Jung had taken it upon themselves to make sure that even the people that _could_ have given him a reprieve from the constant onslaught of Korean wouldn’t. Or maybe it was because he was foreign.

He had a feeling that had something to do with it. There were a lot of nasty looks he got. Well, not him so much as the hitai-ite he wore. He had actually made it his personal mission to get his hands on a blank one so he wouldn’t have another barrier in communicating and learning from the people around him. This had been met with no success until Haku showed up, dragging a blue-haired young man behind him who had one with him.

_“It’s a Kiri headband, but I scraped as much as I could off.”_

Chojuro was kind, and if Haku wasn’t around he would talk quietly to Iruka in Japanese. He had helped him track down a slightly better hitai-ite, one that had a thicker piece of metal on it to fulfill its other purpose – protecting the forehead or neck from projectiles.

Of course, it wasn’t all bad, having to speak Korean. It had been fun trying to teach Chae-Seon’s genin team Japanese with the little Korean he knew. There wasn’t much he could teach them in the beginning, but each day the Korean came a little easier and he was able to teach them a little more. In the evenings he could sometimes even speak Japanese with them and get away with it because he was teaching.

He was staying in Chae-Seon’s room, if the limited décor that had been matched to a number of books (most of which were in Korean, though there was one on sealing and water manipulation that had some diagrams with Japanese on them that he had been working his way ever so slowly through) and side projects.

The one that surprised him most was one that was some kind of condensed water jutsu. The notes were all in Korean, making it hard to read them, but he could follow the handsigns inscribed by the diagrams. Working with different chakra amounts, he had managed to do something close to what he imagined was the intent.

He would have to ask Chae-Seon about it later.

He had known when she had come into his class and managed to maintain a complete alter ego to her genuinely friendly nature that she would make a great shinobi. Her time in his class where she proved a clear academic aptitude only asserted that. These notes were further proof he had been right.

Chojuro knocked on the door as Iruka tried to parse through a text, a notebook out that had a number of words in a column that he didn’t know. “Hey, you hungry?”

“Not really.”

“Have you eaten since breakfast?”

Iruka shrugged. He had his lessons that morning, had trained with Chojuro and Haku (which always made him feel like he knew nothing and was a failure as a shinobi, because these kids were so much younger than him and could kick his ass so thoroughly. He was getting better though, which was encouraging), and had come home to read.

Had he eaten?

“You need to eat, Iruka-shi. Come on.” Chojuro, for his kindness, knew how to guilt someone into doing what he wanted. It was his own brand of caring for someone. Chae-Seon had, from what he had seen, a rough way of caring that combined haphazardly with a genuine mothering instinct. Haku had a natural medics aptitude for bedside manner, but mainly left those he cared about to seek his help if they needed it.

He had no idea about Suigetsu, but he suspected some of Chae-Seon’s own rough attitude had come from being around him so much.

Chojuro took the book out of his hands, glancing at it. “Man, you must be doing really well. Korean is my native language, and I have trouble with this stuff. I have no idea how Chae-Seon does it.”

Well, that would explain a lot.

“What’s it even about?”

Chojuro chuckled. “Nice to know I’m not the only one lost on it.

“It’s a book about sealing and chakra theory in the context of some of Kirigakure’s specialty seals. Uzugakure may have started the art of sealing, but in the absence of access to Uzumaki techniques, Kiri found a way to use it on their own.”

Iruka nodded. “Interesting.”

Haku came into the apartment, Soo-Jung following in and collapsing on the couch like she lived there too, the genin following her and taking up the other spaces around her. Jeong-Hwa took a seat beside Iruka, passing him a book. Now that there were people around, the conversation would undoubtedly switch to Korean.

“This is a textbook we started using in the Academy. The translation department just finished with it. It is fairly basic, but the vocabulary should be helpful.”

“Are you teaching him -----?”

“What’s that mean?”

A Japanese response from Jeong-Hwa. “Slang.”

Iruka nodded, filing it away. “Slang have not… ah… Slang has not me learned?”

Soo-Jung smirked, the girls giggled, and Jeong-Hwa fixed him with a _look._ “It would be ‘I have not learned slang’.”

Iruka nodded. The grammar was very flexible, but there was a nuance to it that still tripped him up. Particles marked everything, but what specific ones meant was ambiguous.

“We are working on your particles tomorrow. That’s a given.”

Iruka nodded. “That.”

“Say it.” Jeong-Hwa gave him a look. He had never sparred with him, he hadn’t even seen Jeong-Hwa fight, but he had the distinct impression the man worked in translation only because he wanted to.

“I have not learned slang.”

“Good. Now go grab that notebook I know you have and write it down. I’ll check your spelling when you’re done.”

He hadn’t felt this embarrassed about admonishment since he was in the Academy.

Come to think of it, he wasn’t sure he had been admonished like that since he was in the Academy. Not in a way that was so clearly a ‘You can do better.’

He couldn’t say he missed it.


	11. Time Goes Too Fast

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chae-Seon's time in Konoha seems to blink by. 
> 
> Iruka's little fan is a future academic, he can feel it. Even if she's only looking into it to advance her career, he thinks he'll get along with his newest student just fine. 
> 
> Not edited, because I'm already like a week late. Classes have me dead, friends. Finals are in four weeks, though, so I'm almost done.

Kakashi had heard of war games before. They weren’t an exactly _foreign_ concept, per say, but they certainly hadn’t caught on in Konoha. Between the Sandaime, who had always pushed as hard as he could for the maintenance of peace, Minato, who had come out of a war wanting nothing more than to never see a child fight one again, and Tsunade, another war veteran with no desire to encourage it, the practice was one used only in ANBU, and only a few times as a training exercise.

Chae-Seon and Suigetsu, however, had enraptured his team with their war game. The rules had been explained after the first round had failed miserably, barely a challenge for Suigetsu and Chae-Seon. Since then, the game had been an everyday occurrence.

The rules were fairly simple. They constituted one team, a pair up, and Kakashi’s team would have to either capture one, or land what could be considered a potential kill-shot on them. Any attack was fair, but if it could genuinely kill then it had to be cancelled before actual impact, unless it was effectively blocked or cancelled out. Suigetsu made noises about this just being for ‘soft little Konoha pansies’,  making it so Chae-Seon had to assure Naruto and Sasuke that there was _no_ way they considered them soft. Kakashi didn’t buy it for a second.

At the end of it, the group was collectively exhausted. Chae-Seon and Suigetsu were leaning against a post while the other three were laying in the grass.

“How are you not _dying?_ ” Karin was an interesting character. When she had first joined the team, she had been hesitant and unsettled. Settling into Konoha had been difficult, it appeared.

Meeting her cousin changed a lot of that, and now she was more than comfortable with her team.

Suigetsu scoffed. “We’ve got a literal demon on our team back home. He’s _ruthless_.”

“Aw, come on. Dae-Suk isn’t _that_ bad.” The shit-eating grin on Chae-Seon’s face told Kakashi she was being deliberately coy.

“I’m not talking Dae-Suk, and you know it.

“Haku literally stuck me in the ass with a senbon once in training and pretended he had no idea why you and Dae-Suk were laughing. And that’s just the fuckin’ tip of the iceberg with him. I’m telling you, he has this whole innocent act going and he’s not. That. Innocent.”

Kakashi, for one, hadn’t thought about Haku in several years, rather preoccupied with keeping his team alive. Now, though, he had to wonder how the young man had adjusted to being back in the country he had run from.

“That’s enough about your kinky sex life, Jong-Min.” Where Riko’s sense of humor had been wit and snark, and Ren’s had been biting and cold, Chae-Seon’s was very much a teasing brand of sass.

“Wait, Ri-chan, you work with Haku?”

“Yeah.” Chae-Seon shrugged. “He’s nice enough off the training field, but he’s a fucking taskmaster.

“He was in charge of a mission I was on once… I’m not allowed to do infiltration with him ever again.”

Sasuke raised an eyebrow. “Why?”

“Because my missions go to shit, and Haku was so concerned I was going to die he accidentally froze our target, exposing us _and_ killing him before we could drag him back to T &I. We missed out on what could have been a trove of good intel.”

“Is that one declassified yet?” Suigetsu looked a bit concerned, prompting Kakashi to begin worrying. Chae-Seon could be executed if she had accidentally revealed information to foreigners.

“I don’t know. Probably. Most of my non-solo, specialized missions were.”

Suigetsu shrugged. “True. And that one’s pretty well-known. Since Mei likes you anyway, if you fucked up she’ll probably just do a retroactive declassification.”

“True.” Chae-Seon shrugged, being inappropriately nonchalant about possibly having revealed classified information.

Kakashi was so proud. Worried, but proud.

* * *

It had taken three days for Ino to find out the female Kiri shinobi in town was actually Riko, and she was going to _kill_ Shikamaru as soon as she saw him.

First, however, she had to find her friend. They had split apart a bit after the Academy, and then she had disappeared. No way was Ino letting her get away that easy. She wanted a spar with the girl, and she wanted it as soon as she could get it. She had been taking her training seriously the last two years, and Riko had always been so strong.

She was going to match her one day, she just needed to know how far she had to go yet.

“You’re taking me to your sister!”

“Ino!”

Asuma-sensei sighed from the side. “Shikamaru, you could have saved yourself all this pain. Just show her where Riko is, please?”

“Yeah!” Ino smirked. “Sensei said you had to!”

“He did not!” Shikamaru scowled. “Fine. But only so you stop pestering me.”

He wouldn’t want anyone to know he lost his cool. Which is exactly why she was going to tell Kiba and Naruto as soon as she saw them – they were the loudest shinobi in the village, after all.

* * *

Jae-Un glared the Konoha man down.

“You said you would teach me Japanese.”

The man faltered. “What? Could you repeat that?”

“You saaaid you would teach me Japanese.”

He perked up. “Oh! Whenever you want to um… um… read… no… work! Whenever you want to work on it, let me know.”

“How about right now?”

She didn’t give him time to answer – or for Jeong-Hwa to protest as she pushed her newest teacher to the board and chucked him a piece of chalk.

* * *

“Why are all your friends so _boring_?” Suigetsu leaned his head against a tree, groaning. Her brother’s team had decided to drag them away from Team 7 in the middle of the afternoon, the walk going towards the merchant district of Konoha. “What is wrong with this place? Is it all the sunshine? Is it how dry it is?”

“Chill, Oppa. It’s not a big deal.”

Shikamaru shifted. “Why do you call him that?”

Chae-Seon and Suigetsu paused. “Huh?”

“Why do you call him ‘oppa’?”

Ino raised a brow, “What’s it mean?”

“It’s just a term for friends.”

“No it’s not!” Shikamaru didn’t get angry, not when they were kids, and not now. Whatever was going on, Ino wasn’t sure how to handle it.

“It is!” Chae-Seon was suddenly tense, and Ino felt extremely uncomfortable. This was a family fight, this was a _private_ fight.

“How can you say that? You literally call him your older brother!”

Ino’s eyes widened. Chouji had stopped eating. Something like this was so far from appropriate for the public. Why were they having this fight in front of people?

“It doesn’t just mean ‘older brother’, though!” Chae-Seon was tense. “It’s just a term of endearment for an older male friend.

“You haven’t been living in Kiri. You barely know Korean, you don’t know the culture.”

“Bullshit!”

“Spending time in the refugee quarter doesn’t count, and you know it! Besides, those people are civies! You think they’d know shit about shinobi culture in Kiri?

“Shikamaru, you’re my brother. I love you. But Suigetsu is my brother-in-arms. He’s taken blows for me, he’s dragged me out of the fight, and he’s thrown me in the medics’ tent when I was too exhausted to move. Through the most fucked up experiences of my life, he was _there._ ”

Shikamaru was pale. Ino had never seen him ruffled, never seen him let on that something bothered him. And now he was pale, he was looking at Chae-Seon like something was clicking into place, something he had known but hadn’t understood.

Ino could see it. He was a man who made a habit of knowing whatever he could so he could strategize. He always knew what was at stake, how to work around an obstacle.

But this was something he hadn’t really understood, and for the first time he couldn’t know everything about the situation without understanding.

“He was there.” Shikamaru repeated Chae-Seon’s last words. “He was there, and he protected you. He had your back. He was your comrade.”

Something passed between the siblings. Suigetsu was scrunching his nose at the two.

“I swear, Deongsaeng, if you get all emotional and shit I’m grinding your ass in the dust and laughing at your pain.”

Suddenly she and Suigetsu were fighting, shoving and shouting and laughing through it all.

Ino glanced at Shikamaru, relaxing finally as she saw the look on his face. The smirk was small, and he was still shaken, but it was there. Shikamaru could see his error, he had adjusted as needed. And now he was enjoying having his sister in-village for the first time in two years.

“Hey! Shark-face! Don’t think that just ‘cause I’m from Konoha I’m any weaker!” Ino stood up and ran in to fight alongside Riko. After all, teamwork was one of the things Konoha was most known for.

* * *

Haku forgot what quiet was like. Between Chae-Seon’s explosive luck and Jong-Min’s explosive personality there was very little space for quiet. Add that to the backdrop of a war, and quiet had ceased to exist in Haku’s world.

And now it had returned. It was peaceful, still, serene like the times he would go to gather herbs for himself or Zabuza, or times when he was awake on watch.

He hated it. It was too still, too peaceful. There should be sound crashing somewhere. There should be sound. It wasn’t just the absence of Chae-Seon and Jong-Min, it was the stillness. It was so pervasive, and as much as Haku loved that the country was finally at peace, he hated being trapped in the stillness. He didn’t realize how mobile his world had been until it was still.

The genin helped. They were all energy and excitability they didn’t know how to channel. They worked their issues with the world out with steady progress, working themselves into the ground one day and then using the exhaustion the next day to their advantage.

They were all reflections of the adults around them, as much as they were their own individuals. He didn’t like to think about it, but it was true. They were, as himself, his team, and their associates were, traumatized by the war. Haku saw people in colors, and the war had crept into their souls, and it had stained them. They were red with shed blood, gray with tears and mourning, and a burning white-blue fire of anger.

The green of naivete and the yellow of youthful joy had run out of them as they soaked themselves in the swamps.

These girls were no exception, but it was sadder to see. The youngest among them was ten, the oldest a mere twelve, and they had been thrust into a life the rest of them had willingly chosen.

War had no color as far as Haku could tell. He had learned that people bore their colors in their tattoos, their clothing, and their language, but war had none of those. It just had blood, and mud, and ripped clothing.

It had his childhood and his adolescence, and it marred all of his friends. And the worst of it was that now he had the peace he wanted, but he felt himself still in that void of no color that he had grown in. Peace was no different, but it required different skills.

“Seonsaengnim, you’re thinking too hard again.”

Mi-Na had taken to him quickly. She was quiet and reveled in the silence he used to teach her with. He had her practice meditations to improve her chakra control, he had her research history and science and math on her own time, giving him papers about that afternoon’s topic as she went. He almost didn’t want Chae-Seon to come back and take this from him, as though he couldn’t ask her to let him keep working with her genin.

“Ah. Let me see yesterday’s research again, then.”

 She passed him the papers. She had a limited supply, and paper, while coming into the country in higher quantities, was still expensive for a genin. Haku would have to get her some more one day.

Her handwriting was cramped into the narrowest margins she could safely use. The research was thorough, and much of the writing was abbreviated as much as possible. Mi-Na was particular, but she was ruthlessly efficient. Of the three genin, he knew she would be the one snapped up for research or T&I the fastest.

He had talked one night, late at night, with Chae-Seon. It was more uncommon in Kiri than in other places not to specialize in something. The force was so small, and the country itself so scattered that it was impractical to not have entire wings of specialization. Chae-Seon was hardly the only Infiltration and Assassination specialist, and Haku was nowhere near the only poisons and medicine specialist.

These three were, like all genin taught during the war, groomed for a specialty. Ji-Su would likely be one of their diplomats or guards. She had the temperament of the heiress she had been born to play, and it would match well with the more formal cultures around Kirigakure. Mi-Na, they knew, would likely end up in Torture and Interrogation or in Research and Development. Either of those departments would jump for a girl as bright and efficient as she was.

Haku hadn’t voiced it, but he had a sinking feeling it would be the former. Her complete devotion to a task until its completion made her well-suited to their needs. He had even heard some of the members talking about the genin teams that were forming around Kiri and which ones they thought would be best for their work. There was no way to be sure, but from what he had heard, she was one of their top picks.

It was Jae-Un that was most at risk. She was a brawler, like Suigetsu, but she had the kind of mental acuity that would likely get her drafted into the next Seven Swordsmen group under the best scenario. Under the worst scenario, though, she could be thrown into the Frontmen, a group of frontline fighters that had a depressingly high soldier turnover and death rate.

He doubted Chae-Seon would let that happen, but there was still the concern. If someone requested her and the Mizukage approved it, there was no way for her, even as their teachers, to force it back. There was no fighting the decision once it was made, and for good reason. Teachers were protective of their students, and they tried to get the best positions for them. Too much of that could weaken Kiri, though, and everyone knew there had to be at least a few front line fighters.  

Haku would do what he could to keep her out of the Frontmen. He knew Chae-Seon and Soo-Jung would too.

It was just a matter of luck after that. Something Chae-Seon wasn’t exactly known for.

* * *

Shikaku noticed the tension between his kids almost immediately. Even if he and Chae-Seon didn’t speak much upon entering Konoha, he had picked up a few tells that she hadn’t eliminated. Subtle shifts of her weight or twitches of her muscles that had been honed down into something barely noticeable, something many would ignore in battle.

“Alright, sit down.”

Yoshino nodded, thanking him as she finished dinner.

Shikamaru followed his order, Riko leaned against a wall, gesturing for Suigetsu to sit outside.

“I said sit down, Riko.”

“Chae-Seon.” She followed the order, but didn’t seem to notice the correction she had made.

“Chae-Seon, then.” Shikaku looked between the two. “What’s wrong?”

Something in Chae-Seon relaxed where she sat while Shikamaru seemed slightly uncomfortable. “He’s got a stick up his ass, that’s what.”

“I do not!”

Shikaku gestured for Shikamaru to be quiet. “And why do you say this?”

“Because he gets mad about a nickname. Who does that? You’re a shinobi, you shouldn’t be worried about what nicknames my comrades and I give each other.”

“But you literally called him ‘older brother’.”

Shikaku could see where this was going. “Is that what ‘oppa’ means?”

Chae-Seon rolled her eyes. “Not you too! That’s one meaning. It has other meanings too!”

Shikaku shook his head. “I’m not saying it’s a bad thing.” Shikaku looked to Shikamaru. “Do you know why I’m so close with Inoichi and Chouza?”

“Because you guys were a Genin team.”

Shikaku shook his head. “Not entirely.

“Genin teams aren’t supposed to get along. You’re supposed to learn to get along with people you don’t necessarily like and how to work with them, because diplomacy is a necessary skill for a shinobi. No one will ever say it, but that’s why we typically put two academically successful genin with the dead last, why we put the lazier with the driven, and why we put the more high-maintenance with the more low-maintenance. If you can get along with people you don’t necessarily like – if you can make friends with those people, even – you have an invaluable skill that can’t be taught in the Academy.

“Chae-Seon, you have a Genin team, correct?”

Chae-Seon nodded.

“And are they all compatible personalities?”

She shrugged. “Not really. If they were here I imagine they wouldn’t have spoken much. It’s the war that got them to work together so well.”

Shikaku nodded. “And that’s what happened with my team, why we became successful. The war hit shortly after we graduated, and we were soldiers. We couldn’t squabble on the battlefield – it would have gotten all three of us killed.”

“Shikamaru, I never want you to see war. I didn’t want Riko to see war. It’s terrible.

“But she has seen war, and that brings teams together, it’s a shared trauma. It’s not uncommon to consider the people you serve with as close as family. Those bonds don’t just go away, and it takes a lot to break them once they’re formed.”

“So you’re saying that she’s basically adopted that asshole?”

Chae-Seon laughed. “Nah. He adopted me. But yeah, you’re stuck with him.”

Shikaku shook his head. He could see it in his son’s eyes, his point had gotten across. There was a clearer understanding of the situation.

“Ugh. He better be good at Shogi, then.”

“Nope. He sucks worse than a dead man.”

“What?”

“You know, really bad?”

Shikaku glanced at her. “But how does that phrase even make sense?”

Chae-Seon waved her hand in the air, not gratifying a response. “It’s just a phrase, don’t overthink it.”

“I knew it. He’s made you dumber.” Shikamaru sighed. “Why do you always befriend troublesome people?”

“Life is more interesting that way.”

The groans that followed Chae-Seon as she left were slightly more positive. His son would have to process it, but Shikamaru was at least a bit less tense than he had been when they started.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I missed a week. Classes have me dead, so updates might be a bit slower the next few weeks.   
> If you're interested, a couple of unexplained worldbuilding things, like normal:   
> 1\. The Korean word for 'read' and the Korean word for 'work' are very close. They're "irlk" and "irl" respectively (really bad transliteration, but it's approximate). For someone who is learning the language, this could be kinda confusing, which is why Iruka has some trouble with it when talking to Jae-Un. 
> 
> 2\. I wanted to play with the idea of Shikamaru's reconciliation of Riko/Chae-Seon's last few years. There's going to be some stuff later that will be some of her teammates and the like, but Shikamaru in particular has a lot of other stuff to comes to term with. His sister literally calls someone else 'brother', she's bonded with these people to the point she trusts them as much as she does Shikamaru (even if he hasn't seen the entire team). I thought it was important for Shikamaru to be faced with this, really faced with this, and realize that becoming the Bloody Flower comes with its own challenges, some of which is mitigated by her team, who are just as much her brothers/family as he is. 
> 
> 3\. So I take a lot of liberties. Kiri is not accurate to Korea in terms of culture, but that's because this is a culture that just came out of a war, and has a history of intranational conflict. They won't have some of the ideas about manners that Konoha and others do because they don't have the time for social layers and niceties - they have been at war, and their culture is much more direct and blunt as a result of that. What I mean by this is that Kiri's culture prizes honesty and direct confrontation over layers of politeness and politicking. What is polite is that which is direct. 
> 
> 4\. "Sucks more than a dead man" is not a Korean phrase. It's something I made up to be an idiom in Kiri for someone who's really bad at something. Idioms I've found are a cute way for language/cultural exchange to happen.


	12. Returning Home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chae-Seon enjoys her return to Kirigakure. Iruka wonders at how her team is preparing for their careers.

Coming home to Kiri shouldn’t have felt as good as it did. She had just been ‘home’ to Konoha, but it had felt like she was in a foreign country. She was rooming with Chojuro, sure, since Iruka had her room, but it was _home_ here.

For instance, she didn’t get yelled at for being too loud in the morning or a look for drinking too much coffee.

Instead she and Suigetsu got to pester Iruka in the morning as he looked dead over a table.

Iruka glared at her over the cup of coffee being handed to him. He was on his first cup, _like a child,_ and Chae-Seon was pouring her third. He scoffed as he watched her throw a little sugar in it and chug.

“You know, maybe you would be taller if you didn’t drink so much coffee.”

“Yeah, Jong-Min’s been saying that since we became friends, along with calling me midget. You wanna pick a fight you have to try harder”

Suigetsu laughed, punching Iruka’s back. “Yeah, she’s going to be on her third cup by the time you manage to finish your first.”

Iruka looked up at her like she was a monster. “Is that even healthy?”

“No.” Haku glanced at Chae-Seon. He was _so much nicer_ after the coffee had been served. “That doesn’t stop her, though.”

Chojuro had his own cup, half filled with milk like a _fool._ “That’s not coffee.”

Chojuro glared at her. “It still has caffeine in it.”

“Not enough.”

Iruka glanced at her as she filled her second cup. He had barely gotten through the first half of his. “I’m beginning to think there isn’t enough caffeine in the world for you.”

Chae-Seon stopped where she was. Her coffee sat in front of her, but he watched her knock back a good third of the cup before turning to him. “You know, you might not be wrong.”

Yeah. Kiri was comfortable.

* * *

Jae-Un pestered the man repeatedly, but something about having her teacher just start speaking to her in Japanese and expecting her to follow orders made her begin to remember the bits and pieces of the language, despite having very little actual knowledge of it.

There was a wall of water closing in on her, though, so she didn’t have time to try and yell at her teacher in Japanese. “I surrender!”

“Surrender?”

“Yeah!”

Chae-Seon backed off, giving her a look. “I’ll allow it this time, but you need to stop panicking when you get caught and start trying to find a way out.

“The day you become a chuunin is the day I stop letting you surrender.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Now go wash up and meet Iruka. Your lessons starts soon, right?”

Jae-Un nodded, racing away, leaving Chae-Seon with Mi-Na and Ji-Su.

* * *

Iruka had gathered how to say he was going from point A to point B, but he hadn’t expected his name to be roped into a joke about it by the three cretins Chae-Seon called students.

Iru and Suig were, apparently, the names of two villages within Kiri (though one had been razed in the war, its citizens absorbed as a neighborhood of the same name in a larger nearby town).

‘Suig-esso, Iru-Kaji’ had become a new phrase for the three to use whenever the two were in the room, even if he was “Iruka-sensei” to Jae-Un, and Suigetsu was ‘Sunbae’ to the three of them. The rules regarding respect in Kiri were drastically different, as far as he could tell. While they were more rigid in some respects – your respect had to be earned, and if you were a child, your respect was assumed for a military power – they were also looser. People who were younger often didn’t consider their older peers as their ‘sunbae’, or senior, unless they were their actual superior on one or more missions.

As such, the jokes that were lobbed at him and at Chae-Seon’s professional team – another concept that had a certain Kirigakure unique-ness to it – were not considered disrespectful or rude in the slightest. Instead it fostered camaraderie with the younger generations.

Iruka had met quite a few shinobi through his own Korean teacher and through Chae-Seon’s team that felt a fierce, familial protective instinct over the genin. In Konoha, he had been aware that many people tried to distance themselves from the Genin. They were green, and they were soldiers, and they would have to learn the same lessons everyone else did – teamwork was paramount, the village was their truest loyalty, and the enemy would consider their lives forfeit.

The longer Iruka was here, the more he learned from the Kiri shinobi. He had to wonder if this cultural exchange would help change Konoha for the better.

“Iruka?” Chae-Seon punched his arm, something it seemed was both a reprimand and a signal of affection with Kirigakure shinobi, before glancing in front of her again. She always knew what was going on around her. She was never fazed.

“Yeah?”

“What’s going on in that head of yours? You’ve been glaring down the road for a few minutes.”

“Nothing.”

“Yeah, right.” She kicked a small rock up at him, looking him in the eye. “You keep telling yourself that. But the second it becomes a threat you let someone know, yeah?”

“Yeah, of course.”

Jae-Un was suddenly on his shoulders, her legs wrapped around his neck in an effort to choke him. She had taken to sneak attacks lately, basing them off of her role models’ (something she had forced him to never reveal). He knew Chae-Seon had her reservations for the girl, worrying she would be taken into front line fighting.

No way was that happening, though. The girl was getting better every day, getting the drop on him more than once in a way that would be deadly if she wasn’t being purposeful in restraining herself. She would be made into an assassin or similar if there was ever cause for it, not a front-line fighter.

“You’re getting better at that.” Chae-Seon cuffed her palm against Jae-Un’s shoulder. “Your next goal should be getting the jump on him and taking him down. Don’t show too much mercy just because you like him. Then you get in the habit, and you die.”

“Ne, seonsaengnim.”

Iruka scoffed. “You’re turning your team into monsters.”

“Good. Monsters are damn hard to kill.”

And wasn’t that the crux of it. The crux of why she was an excellent pick as a Jounin sensei. She had a long vision, and she had the war experience to back it up. She didn’t just protect her Genin while helping them gain the skills to go up in rank. No, she taught them how to kill or be killed, how to leave the battlefield standing and with as few enemies as possible.

She taught them how to be shinobi, something he could respect. He had wondered after her team and her brother’s had crossed blades with Zabuza if it wasn’t a bad idea to put more focus in the Konoha Genin curriculum on battlefield-type experiences or on practicality in the field. He, granted, had limited experience fighting in the field.

But he had seen the consequences after the invasion of the oversight. The teams weren’t thinking long view when they were fighting for their lives. They were astounding for Genin, but they had also been a liability. They didn’t adapt to different groups, or to quickly changing circumstances.

And here he saw a team under the command of a Jounin, not one under their tutelage. And those girls were thriving for it. She had the right idea, as far as Iruka was concerned, when it came to teaching her Genin.

“You’re staring into space again, Iruka.”

“Ah, sorry.”

“Just stop it, will ya?”

“Of course.”

Jae-Un giggled. “Are all the Konoha shinobi such pushovers?”

Chae-Seon pushed her head a little to the side while Iruka laughed nervously. Kiri was so damn strange sometimes. Had he been expected to fight it?

“Don’t listen to her. You don’t have to live here indefinitely – you’ve got a couple more weeks here and then we drag you back.”

“What will I be doing about teaching the language if I am not entirely fluent?”

“You’ll teach basics. Last I heard you’re getting someone going with you to teach higher level Korean, as needed.”

Iruka nodded. “Alright.” A thought struck him. “What if we did a language exchange program?”

Jae-Un glanced at him. “A what now?”

“People from Kiri come to Konoha and learn Japanese, people from Konoha spend time in Kiri like I did and learn Korean.”

“Let it get to that first.” Chae-Seon was rolling a senbon around her fingers. “The alliance has to be settled first.”

Iruka nodded. She wasn’t wrong.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finals are almost here, and then I'll have more time to write. Sorry for the long breaks between updates!


	13. A Darker Reality

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As much as they liked to pretend otherwise, there was a lot that made their world dark and harrowing, even with its brighter moments.

Iruka was woken up by an alarm in the middle of the night. Chae-Seon ran in, told him to stay put, and then jettisoned herself out her window, joining what was quickly becoming chaos in the streets below.

Iruka had felt it while he stayed there – the underlying tension that betrayed the somewhat peaceful (if rough and casually violent) air that was on the streets. There were some merchants who looked at shinobi with caution, some that looked specifically at him. Those ones looked on with disdain, muttering about ‘filthy foreign nin’ and ‘privileged little shits’. Kirigakure tried very hard to give off the impression of stability. Its shinobi patrolled the city just as much as they did from the outposts, the Mizukage made appearances occasionally to boost morale, and the merchants and civilians were doing their damnedest to pretend there wasn’t still damage left from the civil war.

But not everyone was content. Chae-Seon, a student of his that was ten years younger than him, had tried to shield him from it, and she had done a good job. He had actually fallen for the illusion after settling in within Kirigakure.

He really was privileged, then. He was a shinobi, he knew to look underneath the underneath, but he still hadn’t expected this. Still hadn’t

He was stuck inside throughout the riots. There was shouting and screaming, and when Chae-Seon walked in, her jounin team behind her, they weren’t speaking. They had blood on them. Chae-Seon had it in her clothing, on her skin, matted into her hair.

“What happened?”

The four of them looked at him. For the first time, some of that disdain he was used to from cynical civilians was present in them, in their eyes. He was naïve, and while he had seen some of the horror that shinobi faced, he had never had to fight his own people. People he saw every day on the streets.

All he could do as the four of them rotated the shower and went to sleep was consider that he never wanted to see a civil war reach Konoha. It had done damage in Kirigakure that was still too stubborn to heal properly.

He closed the door to the apartment, locking it before he laid down.

He stayed in the room that night, but he didn’t get any sleep.

* * *

The riots had happened before. There hadn’t been one in months, but there was still the expectation of one about to happen, and that had been enough for Mei to have a standing watch throughout the village, particularly once the sun went down.

She was glad of that now, even if the streets were once more coated in blood.

“We need to keep this from our allies.”

Ao scoffed. “You say that like we have concrete alliances.”

“You know what I mean. We had to kill our own people. We can’t have that get back to Konoha.” Mei turned back to her desk, looking at the paperwork. “I know you think it’s a bad idea, but I want the elected civilian bodies fast-tracked.”

“Why? They riot when we piss them off, why reward that?”

“If we give a little, we can gain a lot. Give them a body, let them control civilian curriculums, let them control their taxes, the merchant laws. I have to sign off on all of it anyway, so there’s no concern of an overreach.

“If we don’t give them some form of control, or at least the illusion of it, then we risk this happening again.”

Ao looked long and hard at her before turning to Zabuza. “You’re on her side, aren’t you?”

“I just don’t want us to follow the last two regimes.”

Mei glanced between the two of them before drafting the memo, a note at the top to take it to the civilian council. Elections would be in three months. “If I have anything to say about it, we won’t.”

* * *

Jae-Un had seen riots before. They weren’t uncommon at the end of the war, and she had been forced to fight. It still left a bad taste in her mouth, killing or injuring her own people.

Tossing over in her sleeping bag, she glanced at Mi-Na. She was staring blankly at the ceiling, not even pretending or trying to sleep, her arms spread out.

“You okay?”

Mi-Na shrugged. “I don’t know.”

The feeling was mutual.

“Does it ever get easier, you think?”

Mi-Na turned her head towards Jae-Un.

“They say it does.” Ji-Su sat up from where her sleeping bag was. They all shared a room in a small apartment with an elderly woman that allowed them to pay a lower rent than was probably fair. Ji-Su looked at the window after hearing a small crash and shriek. “I don’t know if that’s a good thing, though.”

Jae-Un joined her in sitting upright, bunching her knees toward her chest. “I don’t know. I’ve heard seonsaengnim never really got desensitized like some of the older shinobi, and she’s a jounin and Swordsman.”

“Yeah, but she says she hated killing to begin with.”

“But she’s a jounin. Even if she doesn’t like it, she should be desensitized. That’s what Suigetsu always says.”

Jae-Un looked back to the wall. “Do we really want to get to a point it doesn’t bug us though? Killing and hurting people, I mean. What does it say about us, if we can kill as many people as she has and we don’t feel it?”

None of them had an answer for that one.

None of them slept that night, either.

*

Jiraiya’s spies weren’t talking. Something had happened in Kirigakure, but they got cagey about the details. It wasn’t until he greased one of them with some booze that anything started coming forward.

“It was…” The man sighed. “That woman… There’s a reason they call her the Bloody Flower. And those other three…”

“What happened?”

Bloody Flower. This couldn’t be good. Jiraiya poured the many more sake.

“There were some people, got real violent late at night. There was… There were some younger shinobi. They were…”

The man shut down.

“Look, she was following orders. I get that. But… That girl is terrifying. No two ways about it.”

Knowing what he knew about Nara Riko, he thought that an apt descriptor. Of her capabilities, at the very least. And if that was a first impression?

Yeah, she wasn’t going to make many friends that way.

“Thanks, kid.”

“I’m 30.”

“And I was a jounin by the time you were born. You’re a kid.”

His informant scowled as he downed the rest of his drink. He stood and left. Jiraiya watched him go and looked down at his notes. A riot in the capital of the Land of Water? That was nothing new. Nothing to tell people much about.

* * *

 Jae-Suk looked at the gate. He always waited a couple minutes after classes let out. Sometimes Shikamaru would pick him up and they would do their lessons somewhere in Konoha – a restaurant, an event. It was always fun.

Sighing, he started kicking a stone down the road. There wasn’t much room in the nicer parts of Konoha for a kid that spoke with an accent as thick as his was, so unless he had Shikamaru it often wasn’t worth his time to try and find something to do. Some parents even said that they worried he would hurt their childrens’ chances if he spoke too much around them. They would ‘learn to speak wrong’.

It didn’t hurt. That’s what he told himself. _Mom would do anything to protect me. That’s what these people are doing for their kids._

But he was sick of giving Konoha the benefit of the doubt. He was sick of being second-class just because his family couldn’t afford to stay and fight. So, instead of trying, he ducked into the front of the refugee neighborhood. It was gated off, but it was a nicer place, in his opinion. The humidity from steaming foods and people using water chakra felt like home, and the trees around him shaded him from the light of the sun. When the shade was just right and the people were at their most carefree he could pretend they never left and that his sister would be in the apartment with the rest of the family.

Slamming the door behind him, he did a quick check. No one was home. All the better for getting his homework done, if he was honest.

Sitting down, he got to work. This was going to take a while without Shikamaru to help him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A little shorter than normal, but I'm hoping shorter chapters make it easier to do more frequent updates.


	14. Chapter 14

Iruka was sent to Konoha with Soo-Jung and Jeong-Hwa. Chae-Seon’s genin team was with them, following the orders of the Mizukage.

“You’re not their teacher, though.” Iruka glanced where Chae-Seon was speaking quietly with her professional team. They were at a local shop, negotiating supplies for some sort of mission. They had been cagey about the type of mission it was, but their gear was significantly different than what he had seen them use before. It was lighter, it was less noticeable, and there were no identifying marks that would put them as members of the Kirigakure shinobi force. The four of them were going on a covert mission that required them not to be identifiable if they were caught. If there was one thing that could be dangerous, it was presenting as a rogue shinobi on any sort of mission.

“I’m taking over while she’s away. Chae-Seon’ll grab them when she’s done with her mission.” Soo-Jung grabbed another set of rations. “They’re used to being passed around, anyway. They can learn some stuff from me they might not from Chae-Seon.”

Iruka nodded. “Where are you guys staying in Konoha?”

Soo-Jung shrugged. “I don’t know yet.”

Jeong-Hwa’s brows creased as he lifted a book of a shelf, checking the price before looking at the subject. “We can’t stay at an in, but there is a chance that the Mizukage can rent us an apartment for the duration of our stay.”

“I take it you’re the teachers then?”

“Yes.” Jeong-Hwa glanced at Iruka. “You’ve made significant progress, and I intend to continue your learning, given the opportunity, but it would be best to have native speakers around to correct grammar and help the students learn idioms.” Jeong-Hwa checked the price of the book again, biting the inside of his cheek as he considered it – a tell of his that Iruka was sure the man knew how to control when he really wanted to – before putting it back. “Besides. Soo-Jung and I will be doubling as ambassadors.”

“Ambassadors? Does Konoha have a treaty with Kiri?”

Neither of them answered, instead paying the merchant and dragging Iruka toward the border of the village. “It’s going to take us several days to get to Konoha, and there’s been some increased criminal activity the further from the village we get.”

“Really?”

“Are you surprised?”

Iruka glanced at some of the passerby as they walked towards the Mizukage’s office. “Why wouldn’t I be? Shouldn’t they be trying to rebuild?”

“With what resources?” Soo-Jung chucked a small pebble at Iruka’s head. “We’ve been working from the capital out to help rebuild to increase safety for our people, but there’s still only so much we can do. We don’t have all the money in the world, and no one wants to invest in a power that they aren’t sure is stable.”

“What did Kirigakure export before?”

“Mostly fish, but some spices and some softer woods for artisans.” Soo-Jung shrugged. “My dad used to make softwood pieces that sold really well in the Land of Fire.”

Jeong-Hwa threw a piece of wood at Soo-Jung. “Mine was a fisherman. He was teaching me when the war broke out. The last Mizukage had him killed for questioning the regime with some of his buddies on the docks.”

Iruka sometimes forgot that all of their countries were still autocratic. That they were still dictatorships. Konoha and others were prosperous and had good relations with the civilian sector that culminated in local council elections in-village. Smaller villages, or ones in more tumultuous circumstances hadn’t had that luxury.

* * *

Chae-Seon grabbed her supplies, sealing it into her belt. “Are we sure we’re ready for this?”

Suigetsu sealed his sword in his wrist. “As ready as we can be. We’re going after a damned good criminal organization, and we don’t know much more than the Mizukage about them. You’ve fought two of them before, but other than that we’re screwed.

“We have to work a cover though, so we’re cutting your hair and buying you a binder.”

“What about Haku? His hair is fairly recognizable.”

“You want to be the one to break it to him?” Suigetsu looked terrified of the prospect.

“He likes you best. Chojuro and I’ll be there to keep you from getting slaughtered, but that’s about all we can do.”

“Come on, Deongsaeng! You can’t do that to me! It’d be worse than leaving me to a pack of wolves.”

“I don’t know man, wolves bite _hard_.” Chae-Seon shook her head. “Haku would make your death pretty damn quick.”

There was a cold hand on her back suddenly, and she was certain there was one on Suigetsu’s as well. “Are you certain, Chae-Seon-shi?”

Suigetsu muttered a fast “Sadist” before he and Chae-Seon bolted from their positions.

* * *

“We’re changing curriculum?” The woman in front of Tsunade was another of a hundred angry civilian parents that had received the curriculum update notice.

“Yes.”

“Why?” She crossed her arms. “What was wrong with the old curriculum?”

“We are pursuing new alliances. In the interest of maintaining these alliances at all levels of the shinobi forces, we are adding the Korean language to the curriculum.”

“We’re adding those… those… those foreigners language to the curriculum?”

“Do you have an issue with that?”

“We already let them into the Academy. Why bother learning their language, too?”

The woman was irate, and Tsunade was sick of people taking a minor curriculum change like this and getting angry. It was fine to teach their children to kill, to take lives, but not to communicate with other human beings.

“Because part of an alliance is communication between the two culture, and that will be easier if our shinobi can talk with the shinobi of Kirigakure.”

“Why can’t they learn our language?”

“They _do._ ”

The woman got up. “Hokage-sama, I just don’t understand. Why do we want these, these, these _barbarians_ in an alliance with us?”

“Ma’am, you’re very close to stepping over the line, and you need to be careful. This is the new curriculum. If you have an issue with it, you can remove your child from the Academy. I am obligated, however, if you make that move, to offer your child emancipation. Any current student being pulled against their will is given this option, and following that, you would be required to cut contact from your child.”

“Hokage-sama, you must not teach these children Korean.”

“Ma’am, you may leave now.”

“Hokage-sama, you aren’t taking this issue seriously!”

“I told you to leave.”

“Hokage-sama!”

“ANBU.”

The woman kept shouting as she was guided out. There wasn’t much of a fight given, but she was strident.

“I’ll be removing my son and daughter from that school! If you insist on teaching foreigners and about foreigners, then I refuse to let you teach my children!”

Tsunade rolled her eyes. Sometimes her own people were infuriatingly stubborn and blind.


	15. Family

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chae-Seon and crew start planning the long view for their mission, and Jae-Suk finds someone he thought long gone.

Her team had slept in worse places, that was certain. They were hiding in a damp cave in Lightning Country, chasing a lead that a less-than-trustworthy informant had given her.

“You’re sure we should be headed right toward their base?”

“There’s no way they would leave it unprotected.” Chae-Seon glanced at Chojuro. His disguise meant his hair was dyed a standard brown, and he wore civilian clothing with sleeves long enough to hide the tattoo he sealed his weapons in. “If we get to a point we think something is suspicious, we back up and wait until we have a way around it. Agreed?”

Chojuro shifted. “I don’t know. It still makes me nervous. Maybe we should try tracking down members first, cut down the potential for reinforcements before we go after their leaders.”

“Do we even know who their leaders are?” Suigetsu had a similar disguise to Chojuro’s, including contacts to support a claim they were brothers. Chae-Seon had dyed her hair dark and cut it short to look like Haku, another pair of siblings.

“We don’t.” Chae-Seon chucked a rock against the cave wall. “But we should try and find out.”

“We could wait…” Suigetsu caught the next rock. “After all, if we make a reputation, we could get recruited and take them out from the inside.”

“To do that we would have wanted to stage something to get their attention and make us rogue shinobi. Quite frankly, I’d rather not have two villages out for my blood, thanks.”

“Why does Konoha even care what you do at this point?” Suigetsu glanced to where Haku had fallen asleep. He had run a late watch the night before, and the three didn’t plan on waking him until they had food of some kind prepared. After that, they had already set up watch shifts.

Chae-Seon shrugged. “At this rate, the Mizukage has pretty much laid claim to me. Konoha may not like it, but even Tsunade can see it. There’s nothing she can do at this point, but she can hunt me down if I go rogue. If I know that woman as well as I think I do, then she would spare no expense.”

Chojuro shook his head, pushing his glasses up along the bridge of his nose. “Complex politics aside, we need a strategy.”

Suigetsu looked back to Chae-Seon. “He’s right, you know. It’s smarter to go after individual members or pairs. That means we’ll gather intel for the other villages, too. If they know what they’re up against, they’ll kill these bastards faster, making our job easier”

“You have a point, there.” Chae-Seon looked to the top of the cave. “So we either do something reckless and find out who their leadership is, or we bide our time and spend who knows how long away from home.”

“There’s a third option. We tell the Mizukage we’re stupidly underqualified and shouldn’t be on this mission without at least one senior Jounin.”

“What? And earn a lifetime of mockery from Ao and Zabuza? Are you shitting me, Jong-Min?”

“It’s an option, I didn’t say it was a good one.” Suigetsu shrugged. “Just so we all know the choices on the table.”

Chae-Seon glanced at Haku. He hadn’t moved once. He was dead to the world. “You’re not wrong… The only one of us that would even consider going for a hit to the pride would be Haku, though, and I’m pretty sure we’ve established that he knows no shame.

“What if they start tracing it back to us, though? They’ll notice when members of their organization start disappearing or dying.”

“We deal with that as needed.”

Chae-Seon looked to the entrance of their cave. “Alright. Individual members it is.”

* * *

“She did what?” Tsunade glared through Shizune to Jiraiya. “Mei should have consulted me.”

“Technically what she did was legal. She sent a notice, she just didn’t mark it urgent. Once the mandatory thirty days passed, she was automatically given the right to execute.”

“But this mission… it’s suicide!”

“She has three other, highly-capable shinobi with her.” Jiraiya shook his head. “It’s dangerous, but if they work as well together as some of my sources have reported, she could survive.”

“You’re not the one that has to explain to three Naras that are already ridiculously worried and protective of her that the leader of a foreign power sent her on a mission that could get her killed.”

“That whole damn war could have gotten her killed. She survived that, she’ll survive this.” Jiraiya shifted past Shizune. “I’ll tell the Nara family. You have enough to worry about.

“But Tsunade… this alliance… it’s worth a lot to Konoha. It’s terrible that we can’t protect one of our own, but we have to think long term, too.”

“You think I don’t know that?” Tsunade ran a hand through her hair before turning toward the window. “I know she’s capable. I know her team has their own reputation.

“But god, Jiraiya. At what point do we bring her home? For good?”

“We might never get to do that.” Jiraiya’s voice was more serious than normal. “She’s been there two years. From what my sources are telling me, she’s bonded as closely to this team as she did her Genin team, if not closer.”

“Bonding over a shared trauma. We saw it a lot during the war.”

“Yeah.” Jiraiya moved to stand beside Tsunade. “You can’t be surprised. Besides, maybe it’s for the best.”

“How so?”

“If she stays in Kiri, we have someone to strengthen the alliance. Someone who would never want to see war between our villages.”

Tsunade shook her head. “I hate it when you’re right. I hate it so damn much.”

Jiraiya laughed, throwing an arm around her. “Get used to it, I’m not planning on being wrong again any time soon.”

Tsunade scowled before punching Jiraiya in the ribs. She’d swear later that she was going light on him. He’d cry that it was the opposite.

* * *

Iruka didn’t realize how excitable Chae-Seon’s genin could be until they got out of Kiri. Within moments the three, while focused and maintaining their pace and route, were roughhousing and goofing off, throwing things at each other in an elaborate game of ‘Dodge’ that nearly took Mi-Na’s eye out.

She, despite being one of the calmer members of the team, laughed it off and responded in kind.

They were monsters, and without Chae-Seon to moderate them, Soo-Jung was encouraging them.

Jeong-Hwa answered Iruka’s unanswered question. “It teaches them pain, but they have fun while they learn it. When they have to muscle through, they’ll already be accustomed to it. It’s been Chae-Seon’s way, too, but she usually has them fight her to encourage teamwork. Bonding is left to Soo-Jung.”

“Why?”

“Soo-Jung looks older than she acts. She may be fifteen, but if you get her relaxed enough she acts like the ten-year-old she was when the war broke out.

“It’s a compliment to you, really.” Jeong-Hwa spared Iruka a glance from the corner of his eye, not breaking his focus from the planned route. “It means she doesn’t see you as a threat.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

Somehow, while reassuring, that also felt like a kick in the pants.

* * *

Kakashi met the three Kiri genin without expecting to. They had shown up, speaking Korean and watching his team train. The one that spoke the best Japanese was quick to try and mimic the kata Kakashi was teaching Naruto.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m, ah,” the girl closed one eye, lifted her hand and started tracing something in the air. “I’m watching you. I wanted to…” she started tracing in the air again. “I wanted to try that kata. It looked like one that our teacher uses.”

Kakashi nodded. These must be Chae-Seon’s genin then. “Alright. Let me show you.”

After all, he was their grand-teacher or something like that, right?

* * *

At first glance, Jae-Suk didn’t recognize her.

It wasn’t until he caught the three girls trailing after two older shinobi that he recognized her.

Jae-Un.

In his shock, he missed his chance to go after her, but he started keeping his eyes open. He was hesitant to tell his mom, because then her hopes could get up before they even had a chance to see her. He had to find her, first, and then he could bring her home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I tried to hint that Jae-Un and Jae-Suk were related, but I don't know that I did a good job, lol. But yeah. 
> 
> The girl that lost her entire family because she got separated and the family that got separated from their daughter. Whoops.

**Author's Note:**

> Korean Names Guide:   
> Choi Chae-Seon: Riko  
> Sim Jong-Min: Suigetsu  
> Choi Dae-Suk: Chojuro  
> Sim Hyung-Min: Haku 
> 
> Riko's Genin Team:   
> Hwa Mi-Na  
> Kim Jae-Un  
> Jeong Ji-Su 
> 
> Korean Terms: 
> 
> Seonbae/Hoobae - Roughly the Korean equivalent to Senpai/Kohai. It is a seniority term, but it isn't (as far as I know) affixed to a name, but is a title.  
> Seonsaengnim - Teacher. Mei was a mentor to a number of her soldiers, and earned the title in conjunction to her title as Mizukage.  
> Oppa/Doengsaeng - terms for siblings. 
> 
> "Oppa" is the term for a girl's older brother/close male friend (note: it isn't meant to have the connotation often associated with romance seen in the west, but is strictly (at least in this story) a way for Riko to acknowledge that she and Suigetsu are close.)  
> "Doengsaeng" (sometimes seen as "Dongsaeng") means "younger sibling". This is, conversely, Suigetsu's way of acknowledging he and Riko are close.


End file.
